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maukree · 1 month ago

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Masterpost with all parts

Heyyyyy, I’m back. Again.

Did you miss me? Don’t answer that, I’m fragile.

Anyway, I just posted Chapter 5 of my increasingly 616-obsessive winteriron fic (you know, the one that this recap was meant to be for and all, not that it got away from me or anything), and it suddenly hit me that I may have jumped the gun there a tiny bit in terms of canon context.

Oops.

So here I am, crawling back into this super short (ha. HA.) recap series to catch up with my own fic timeline before anyone starts shaking receipts at me in the comments. And yes, I’m painfully aware that my very fancy, very curated, very aesthetically pleasing cover art doesn’t actually list half the comics I’ve ended up referencing in these posts, but we’re still on track: from when Bucky pops into the 616 continuity just before Civil War, through all the post-Civil War fallout, and heading straight toward Fear Itself.

Yes, other events are going to pop up in between. No, I’m not updating my Photoshop files to reflect that. Just squint, pretend it’s all intentional, and move on.

Now, as for this specific part, if you read this, you’ll find out:

What happens to Tony as Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.

What happens to Bucky while Tony mostly flails under the weight of the world's dumbest job offer.

That there are some intersections between them, but this is canon, folks, and, sadly, they both spend time banging people completely wrong for them (just my opinion, calm down).

Still, this is the part where, if you make it to the end, you’ll finally know how the hell Tony ends up deleting his own brain after the Secret Invasion—because he’s just that dramatic—and who he sends the only backup to. It’s Bucky. Sorry, I just knew the suspense would be killing you.

Quick reminder: we left off Part 3 with Tony handing Bucky Steve’s shield, Bucky agreeing (somehow??) to let Tony mess around with his brain, and both of them pretending this was totally normal behavior and not the fandom equivalent of swapping promise rings.

Anyhow, let’s go.

Holy shit, you clicked again. What’s wrong with you? Kidding, please stay.

So… Tony has finished emotionally decimating the superhero community via Civil War, and also just had his sexy little moment with Bucky in Captain America (2004–2011).

I might repeat myself a bit here, but I’ll at least try to keep it only to the relevant shit you came here for. (Lies. I will likely repeat myself a lot here, because only a crazy person would re-read their own ramblings to see where I actually stopped. And I will very likely add a ton of completely irrelevant information and too many bad jokes, but if you are reading part 4, you might be sorta into it, so that’s your problem, not mine.)

We are roughly over in Invincible Iron Man Vol. 4 (2004–2007), around Issue #15, where Tony bullshits himself into thinking he’s ready to lead. Despite the fact that he’s been freshly dumped by his entire friend group and is still grieving his dead boyfriend who asked him—in writing, to make it legal and binding or something—to take care of his very stabby former possibly-love.

This stretch of comics in general is fascinating because it’s less about the suit and more about Tony vs. The System, which is hilarious when you remember he is the system now. He’s balancing national security, superhuman politics, his own guilt, and the absolute circus that is post-Civil War America. I mean, you might love him, you might hate him, and he did make a spectacular mess of things in Civil War, but the man’s trying, okay? And the art is really nice.

Invincible Iron Man (Vol. 4) #15–18: The Initiative

This tiny arc is mostly foreshadowing and starts off Tony’s tenure as Director with exactly the kind of subtlety you’d expect from him: by pissing off everyone. Especially Dum Dum Dugan, who, as I’ve mentioned before, is around, is very ginger, has a very impressive mustache that deserves its own comic book run, and has some very strong opinions.

So, let’s talk about Dugan for a second. Because my man is not having it. Tony rolls into S.H.I.E.L.D. with his futurist swagger, immediately starts running it like a Stark Industries satellite office, replaces a beloved cook named Cookie (rip legend, we never knew you, but your name lives on) with a private chef, and suddenly—for completely no reason at all, honestly—Dugan's looking one fabulous lunch away from full mutiny.

I mean… he kind of has a point? From the very beginning, as soon as he takes the job, Tony is so hands-on as Director that it's a miracle anyone else at S.H.I.E.L.D. has anything to do. He’s micromanaging ops and personally suiting up to punch bioweapons, which is, arguably, super effective, but also very infuriating for hardened pros. I kinda agree with Dugan here in a sense that Tony’s behavior is giving the entire agency, who already has deeply repressed authority issues from Fury, too many reasons to call Tony both daddy and their emergency field response unit.

But don’t worry, Sal Kennedy is here to try and convince Dugan that Tony’s fit for the job. If you were around for Part 1 of this totally useless recap series, you’ll remember (or not, I don't remember if I told you about him) Sal from Extremis—Tony’s chill tech philosopher BFF who wears sandals on government property and speaks exclusively like a walking TED Talk. He is ride-or-die Team Tony, which we respect, and Sal spends most of Issue #15 trying to convince Dugan that installing childcare on the Helicarrier is a boss move (it is) and that Tony isn’t an actual threat to the republic (debatable). He’s the only person besides Jarvis who talks to Tony like a human being, which, of course, means he is absolutely doomed.

More on that in a minute.

Meanwhile, over in the “Should’ve Stayed in Jail” department, Maya Hansen is still around. Remember her from Extremis, where she invented nightmare fuel, emotionally manipulated Tony, got him nearly killed, and then helped him inject that nightmare fuel into his bloodstream? Good times.

So, yeah. This gal. Unofficially working on Extremis for Tony, officially killing Tony’s chances of having a normal relationship for the foreseeable future, and vibe-check failing in every panel. She and Tony have that tragic pseudo-ex energy that won’t fucking die already, mostly because she keeps hanging around long enough to remind us she still exists.

And Tony, poor bastard, is just trying to get to the part where he can start obsessing over Bucky in peace—but no. Maya is here with her Extremis research and suspicious side-deal offers behind Tony’s back because everyone in this comic is after Extremis like it’s a completed, no archive warnings applies, slow burn, good smut on AO3.

Also, yes, in case you’re wondering who’s looming in the background all mysterious and villainous—since there’s always one of those per series—it’s The Mandarin. Yay? Different from the MCU, for sure, and you don’t know that yet in these issues, but I do, and now you do, and I’m telling you this man will haunt Tony’s entire run like the yoga-practicing demon asshat he is. He doesn’t do much here at the beginning aside from loom and look ominous and flex his yoga poses, occasionally making me confuse him with Sal (’cause both could use a haircut), but…

Anyway.

By the time we hit Issue #18 and Initiative wraps up Tony’s intro to being Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., things go from “shaky office politics” to “oh no, Tony’s having a trauma spiral again.”

Sal dies.

And it is gnarly. It’s really gross, people, and it leaves Tony absolutely gutted and flashing back to a few folks he’s recently lost, starting with Steve.

Thankfully, this is not a Captain America comic book, and reminiscing about dead friends is more of a Steve move, so the writers of the Iron Man comic book promptly decided that this specific moment could wait and instead gave us an epic naked scene to round this arc off—for which I am willing to forever visit comic book shops on Wednesdays and buy so many I am running out of storage space, hoping for another naked Tony scene.

That. Yeah. Tony takes off his clothes and uses the power of being hot, upset, and nearly dead to defeat an Extremis-inspired biotech weapon. It’s symbolic. It’s sweaty. And yes, I will be including those panels.

This arc ends with Maya, the sweet summer traitor that she is, taking that shady offer and wandering off to go work for the Mandarin. Seriously. Get Bucky on the phone. Or someone else on the phone. Because this isn’t the person Tony should be banging, okay?

At this point, it should be painfully clear that the only person Tony should be entangled with in the 616—or any continuity—is either:

A) A traumatized assassin with a metal arm and an obsessive lip-licking habit

B) A traumatized, mouthy, currently unemployed and on-the-run photographer who goes by Spider-Man

C) Okay, fine, a guy who used to have a shield, but is currently dead, so not dealing with trauma, lucky him

Unfortunately, Peter is busy dealing with his own angst in New Avengers, Steve is, in fact, still dead, and Bucky is somewhere punching fascists and feeling feelings off-panel—which brings us to a small detour to discuss World War Hulk, because I briefly mentioned it in my fic, which I will continue aggressively plugging because it’s Tumblr and nothing is free in this life except maybe actual fanfiction.

Invincible Iron Man (Vol. 4) #19–20: World War Hulk

Ah yes. The event where Marvel looked at the most damaged and in need of a break heroes and said, “Want to be punched in the face?” And Tony, being Tony, said: Sure, I’ll go first. Make sure to hit hard.

A while ago, Tony and his big-brain boyband—also known as the Illuminati, or, as I like to call them, powerful assholes with terrible ideas—decided it would be a genius move to yeet Bruce Banner into space. For reasons, obviously. Because he was too unstable, dangerous, big green feelings, etc., and because nobody in that group has ever heard of successful therapy.

Naturally, Hulk comes back from space with an army, a lot of rage, a spaceship (well, you kinda need one to come back from space, but it’s a cool spaceship), and a very short, extremely pointed “Puny humans, I’m gonna wreck your shit” speech.

This is an actual Marvel event, but in issues #19–20, we stay tight on Tony’s perspective, while others, presumably, have their own tragedy happening. Since I read this event in full donkeys ago and don’t feel like doing it again just yet, here is a basic recap as it pertains to Tony.

Tony is spiraling hard. He feels genuinely awful about what they did. But guilt doesn't stop him from immediately dusting off the Hulkbuster armor to fly straight into Hulk’s fist, since 616 is peak martyr Tony. This is “let me throw my body at a problem because I deserve it and maybe also it’ll prove something to Steve, who’s still dead and everyone would not shut up about it, and Bucky, who’s probably watching” energy. It’s so Tony. And if by now you are at the very least not interested just a little in reading 616 comic books, idk what I’m doing wrong here.

Anyhow, Maria Hill and Dugan, who were skeptical at first, are fully Team Tony by this point. They’re trying to stop him from the full-on confrontation by reminding him they have protocols, but Tony always needs to suffer because he hates himself a little, so suffer he does, and he absolutely does not win.

In fact, Avengers Tower gets leveled, which is deeply rude to all the fic writers who imagined Bucky moving into that specific version someday. Tony gets captured, but still looks great while doing that, assuming you’re into him being all chained up and in a lot of trouble. Panels included for all interested in that dynamic, you perverts. But I am not deleting those screenshots from my phone, so you are not alone. Isn’t that nice?

The actual World War Hulk is pretty fun, and a lot of shit does get wrecked, but Tony isn’t the one to save the day. It all boils down to the very shirt-ripping showdown between two of the most overpowered boys Marvel has ever created: Hulk vs. Sentry. And yes, if you’re here just after the new Thunderbolts movie, it’s that Sentry. Our boy with sad eyes and weird slippers—Bob.

I’m not gonna spoil anything about Bob (much), but 616 is different from the MCU, so don’t worry too much, I guess? The point is, both of them go full God Mode, and for a few glorious panels it’s “trauma vs. trauma,” gamma rage vs. unstable sun-god energy, and absolutely no one wins except the artists who got to draw it and readers who forked out $3.99 per issue for it.

In summary: this is a cool event, Tony gets his beatdown, gets humbled once again, and the city gets a facelift. I wasn’t yet a winteriron shipper when I read WWH, so I actually do not remember what the hell happened to Bucky during this event, but there are no Captain America issues that cover it, so… possibly not much? I assume he punches things.

On a completely unrelated side-note (but also kind of important because I can’t stop thinking about it):

The second I mentioned Sentry, my brain—filthy thing that it is—flashed me straight back to that one issue of Mighty Avengers that ran during the same timeline as Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., and I had to cackle when I remembered Tony got turned into a girl, and the first thing he did as soon as he came to after it was over was check that all of his body parts were still there.

Like. No “is my heart okay,” no “do I still have functioning lungs,” just straight to “do I still have my Stark Industries, patent-pending, nanotech-augmented dick.” Iconic. (I’m kidding about it being augmented, btw—that man has big dick energy, we all know it.)

And no, I am not recapping Mighty Avengers fully here, unless I have to. Because if I do that, I’d have to go back and cover New Avengers properly, and that’s no longer a recap—that’s me writing a wiki.

Just sort of assume that there are many other issues, adventures, and semi-shippy shit happening at the same time as the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. We nod, acknowledge, giggle at Tony pawing at his boy-parts in front of his new team (Bucky excluded for the moment), and, yes, move on.

Invincible Iron Man (Vol. 4) #21–28: Haunted

In this arc, Tony is just trying to do his job, save the world, maybe cry in peace over Steve’s memory, and instead gets absolutely steamrolled by the government, by biotech horror, by Maya “Poor decision making is my thing” Hansen, and, finally, by Mandarin.

It’s important to remember that during his time as Director, Tony is doing the best he can under impossible circumstances. And by “impossible,” I mean: the government is always on his ass, Norman Osborn is also on his ass, Norman Osborn is also just... an ass, and Tony can’t stop losing people.

This lovely eight-issue arc begins with Tony getting mindfucked on his own balcony by hallucinating Steve standing there looking all blond and tragic and judgmental, which is extra delicious for Stony shippers—especially since this is a very tender hallucination moment that hurts in all the right ways. But if you’re here in winteriron goggles, Bucky is currently wearing the stars and stripes, and if Tony saw someone in that somewhat similar suit and had a flash of “Steve?”, there’s a very real chance his brain could've hiccupped and whispered “Bucky?” first.

Anyway. Real Steve is still dead at this point (ish), so hallucination Steve disappears, and Tony is left spiraling. Again.

Then he gets… mindfucked. Also again—this time by Maya, when he’s told she’s dead. Maya, in her defense, doesn’t know she’s being accidentally evil, which is kind of her brand at this point: smart-stupid. She possibly thinks she’s helping humanity but is really just aiding Mandarin who is doing Extremis experiments on kidnapped humans and superheroes in a very evil-looking lab.

Tony, upon learning all this, reacts the way anyone in his position would: by launching an actual investigation. The government, in turn, puts him on probation, and if there’s one thing this arc reinforces, it’s that no one appreciates Tony unless he’s saving the world shirtless and bleeding.

Maya eventually does discover she’s being evil, but still manages to nearly cause a full extinction-level event, since Mandarin’s very classic plan is to unleash Extremis on the world, knowing full well only a tiny percentage of people (Tony included) can survive it.

You’d figure that instead of trying to make it more difficult for him, the government would back off—but instead, Tony gets collared with a device that dampens his Extremis connection, has to use his clunky old Iron Man suit, gets blamed, blocked, and nearly blown up. Which is where it builds to a massive showdown between Tony and Mandarin that includes a lot of sci-fi body horror, Maya yelling science things too late to be helpful, Tony nearly dying, Tony mutilating his own body to rip off the collar and reconnect with Extremis (ugh, that was very ick), and Tony saving 99.9% (or something) of the planet while bleeding out.

It’s pretty epic. It’s horrifying. It’s kind of hot in a very unwell way. And yes, I recommend reading it. At the end of all this, the same government that was just about to fire him suddenly goes, “Oh wait—you’re a hero,” and lets him keep his job.

It’s, obviously, a very squished recap of what actually happens, but do you want me to write up in detail Tony having to slice off his own heel to save the world? Nah, I didn’t think so.

Bucky’s not around in these issues, but he’s wearing the suit, carrying the shield, and probably somewhere hearing the news about Tony almost dying again. Personally, I like to imagine him muttering something like “idiot” under his breath while lowkey loading a sniper rifle labeled “In case of Osborn.”

Invincible Iron Man (Vol. 4) #29–32: With Iron Hands

So, these four issues are technically the final arc of the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. era in this run (unless you count some stuff about War Machine doing War Machine things)—even though Tony keeps clinging to the Director title like it’s an unhealthy relationship (which it is) through the beginning of the next series. Honestly, the timeline is a bit of a mess (classic Marvel), and the next run kinda starts before this one fully ends, but for all narrative purposes: this is where Invincible Iron Man Vol. 4 drops the mic. Gently. Into a crater. While on fire.

You’d think, after everything Tony’s been through—bio-horror of Extremis, Maya-related betrayal, his support system and friends dropping dead all around him, government gaslighting—they’d give him a proper send-off. But no. Then again, maybe it’s perfectly fitting that this run closes out with two separate murder plots, a mini-nuke or two, and literally everyone and their mother acting like Tony on purpose handcrafted their personal trauma in a Stark Industries lab.

The arc is about Tony winning (barely) yet another fight, but also looking like he desperately needs a nap, a decent lay (you know with whom), and five minutes where someone isn’t trying to lecture, blame, or explode him. This arc also has two villains—sorta—because, heaven forbid Tony gets a single uninterrupted crisis. Bad Guy #1 is a former friend turned nuclear hobbyist, since in Marvel, failed friendships don’t simply end in blocked numbers. Bad Guy #2 is a salty ex–S.H.I.E.L.D. scientist-slash-weapons designer who is so terminally offended by Tony’s brilliance that he hijacks a superweapon just to scream “NOTICE ME, SENPAI.”

To the shock of no one—and please tell me you are seeing the pattern here—Tony nearly dies while trying to sacrifice himself.

I could walk you through the whole plot—the plans, the explosions, the monologuing—but it’s frankly boilerplate Evil Genius 101. The real meat of this arc is in the ending, where Tony takes the win and the guilt in equal measure. Broods. Reflects. Self-flags. Stares off into the distance while flashbacking to everyone he’s ever failed and—no, this time fully dressed.

If you’re feeling MCU nostalgia, this is “I remember all of them” mood before the Russos gave that line to Bucky for drama purposes (panel included). This is OG 616 Tony Stark, kinda constipated when it comes to expressing his feelings but fully aware of every ghost he carries around in his tortured Gucci luggage.

Depending on who you ask in the 616 fandom, Tony from this era—with Civil War and all—is either a fascist, a martyr, an idiot genius with bad boundaries, or just a problematic fave with better hair than everyone else.

I say he’s a man doing his fucking best.

Yes, I’m biased. Yes, my "I Heart Tony" goggles are welded to my skull. But this run makes it very clear that Tony always believes he’s doing the right thing—or at least the best possible thing when everything is already falling apart, and the best possible thing is, okay, occasionally, a still pretty shitty choice. And unlike a lot of other superheroes who love to grandstand and sulk from rooftops, Tony actually steps up every time and doesn’t run away from hurt. And, boy, do comic book writers love to hurt him.

616 Tony is wildly flawed, emotionally repressed, and so bad at self-care it makes fanfic-level angst look tame, but he always shows up for people—whether they want his help or not. He tries, even when he knows that his past choices made it impossible for some to even say thank you. Could be why S.H.I.E.L.D.—for a hot second here—actually respects him at the end of this run. Sure, he’s a control-freak boss if there ever was one, but they don’t just tolerate Tony; they believe in him because he never asks his people to do shit he isn’t willing to do himself. And yeah, that belief is going to implode spectacularly the minute we step into the next run and Tony helps to level the whole organization, but shhh. That’s future drama.

We’ll get there.

Okay. So we’ve been elbows-deep in Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. for a while now, and at this point, you might be reasonably screaming: “What the hell is Bucky doing during all this, and please don’t tell me he’s off-panel polishing a gun?”

Well. I'm glad you asked.

It’s time to treat ourselves to Captain America (2004–2011) and catch up with our favorite murder-angel-turned-America’s Sweetheart boytoy.

And yes, before this gets more confusing—let me for the tenth time shout it loud and clear for those in the back: comic book series all happen at the same time, simultaneously, in parallel but out of order, written by four different caffeine-guzzling writers on a gazillion separate timelines.

It’s a fact, no matter how sad, that it’s logical to suspect they don’t even read too much into the issues that do not relate to them directly. And while the guys who wrote Tony’s run didn’t think to include Bucky (we deserved at least one rooftop scene with heavy breathing and unresolved sexual tension), the guys who wrote Bucky’s Cap run did include Tony, because they clearly know he can’t resist orbiting drama that isn’t his.

Quick refresher: this picks up right after Bucky officially steps into the Captain America role, courtesy of Tony, who is secretly funding and outfitting him like it’s his side hustle. Of course, Tony lies about all this to his government bosses because honesty is not for people who are just after meeting the love of their life.

At this point, Bucky’s already thrown a few punches in the suit, decided he’s definitely not Steve, and fully committed to his own personal combat aesthetic: gun in one hand, shield in the other, a lot of fucks suddently left to give. This man is perfect, and his main bad guy to deal with is Red Skull who is lurking in the background like a racist cockroach.

Sharon is still around (we love her), but girl is having a time. She’s pregnant with Steve’s baby, which is already a lot, was the one to kill him (oh, honey, I know brainwashing ain’t fun), and she’s also currently being mindfucked by Red Skull, which is somehow the least of her problems. Last we saw her, she faceplanted over a mysterious sci-fi tube in an evil lair she’s currently hanging out in, inside said tube finding someone who looks suspiciously like her dead baby daddy.

Captain America (Vol. 5) #37–#42: The Death of Captain America Act 3: The Man Who Bought America

This arc is super packed. Not plot-wise (meh), but emotionally, sexually, and with more sweaty men in tight costumes than a single arc should be legally allowed to contain, and this is me saying it.

Things get rolling with Tony trying to explain to Sam (Falcon) that his whole “I gave Bucky a shield, lied to my bosses, and started secretly outfitting him like a blushing sugar daddy” thing isn’t what it looks like.

Sam’s not buying it, and neither are we, because let’s be honest: this smells strongly of love at first sight. That shield was not handed off platonically, okay? You don’t break protocol for just any guy with cheekbones and a murder record, and nobody can convince me otherwise. You can, of course, try, but when was the last time you won an argument on the internet?

Right.

Anyhow, Sam, who is hanging out with both unregistered heroes and Tony because he’s a good guy like that, is very unofficially—but also very emotionally—asked to “keep an eye” on Bucky. Aw. Again, that’s either babysitting, low-key stalking on Tony’s part, or the 616 equivalent of “he needs someone who isn’t me to make sure he eats.”

As for the actual plot, yeah, yeah, evil guys are trying to install their own president via independent candidate blah blah political corruption blah, but who the fuck cares when the shippy content is this loaded?

Such as: Clint shows up at Bucky’s place while Bucky’s sweaty and angsty (arrrr), and they proceed to have a feelings-heavy pow-wow about what it means to wear the suit and be Cap and carry that legacy and—yeah. Winterhawk is practically canon-adjacent, tbh, and the sparks are flyyyying as Clint and Bucky have their first interaction in this timeline.

This is where we pivot to Sharon, who’s still being held hostage in Red Skull’s lair of awful and finally stumbles into a tube containing... someone who looks a hell of a lot like Steve. But… sadly not Steve. Clone Steve, since this collective trauma lasagna clearly needed more layers. So, back in evil plot town, the bad guys are still pushing their off-brand evil president, but now with a combo pack of cloned Steve they’re trying to pass off as Captain America. If you’re a little confused, we’re in this together. Let’s just assume the bad guys think this is a cool, normal, stable plan.

Some things do progress, such as: Bucky going head-to-head with evil Clone-Steve in a mutual homoerotic recognition; Sharon getting into a bit of a fight with Red Skull’s demented daughter Sin (who Bucky fucked up a few issues back); and Sam saving Bucky from falling to his death (allegedly—Bucky probably had a backup plan, but sure, let’s give Sam his moment). Bucky and Sam then set off on a shady-motel road trip to track down the clone, who sorta escapes.

I am going to repeat this again:

Sam. Bucky. Bucky and Sam. Go on a road trip that includes very shady motels, and while we are not explicitly told they’re sharing a bed, I only see one, and this was giving off so many gay vibes that Marvel editorial immediately had to send in Nat to join them before folks got the wrong idea.

On a more serious note, by the end of this arc, Sharon finally gets saved by the good guys, but loses the baby she also now doesn’t remember ever being pregnant with, which is heartbreaking. She also gets kinda fired for it, and I am not sure I am with Tony on how he handled that particular HR dispute. Sin is to blame for the baby loss, which was sorta easy to see coming and gutting to read about, and I assume was added in so we have one more reason to hate her annoying AF character.

Bucky, of course, performs like an absolute beast under pressure, wins hearts and minds, and everyone stops side-eyeing the New Cap—though he’s still technically illegally running around as far as Tony’s official stance is concerned.

And the end of this arc—because Marvel giveth and Marvel taketh away—has Bucky celebrate by starting a cozy little hetero-flavored romance with Natasha, which I personally choose to ignore in favor of yelling “winteriron supremacy” all over Tumblr when I’m not busy yelling about winterspider, starker, or, occasionally, winterhawk.

And while I think Anthony Mackie is one of the most gorgeous men I’ve ever had the privilege to water-damage my keyboard over from excessive drooling, I am honestly blanking on what the Bucky/Sam ship is even called, which should give you all you need to know about how much I care about it. I will, however, be fair and keep my own eye for any shippy Sambucky (looked it up, are you people serious with that name?) panels.

The clone doesn’t die, btw—he’s still around and cracked crazy—but a few bad guys do get what’s coming to them. Just not the main cast. Obviously.

Captain America (Vol. 5) #43–#48: Time’s Arrow Arc & Old Friends and Enemies Arc

Okay, I’m not gonna lie—by this point in the reading order, I’m running out of steam, out of chill, and possibly out of character limit. So consider this a speed recap of the two arcs that are very much worth reading, where Bucky is doing some extra brooding, Natasha is being very bendy and helpful, and I am rapidly losing patience because Secret Invasion is coming and so is the Tony-deletes-his-brain moment we’ve all been thirstily waiting for.

But first, here’s what matters for these two arcs—which really should’ve just been one, because they both deal with the same issue, technically. The big mood for this stretch of time is: Bucky has trauma (shocking), Nat has abs (glorious), and Bucky is having some trouble sleeping. Which is unfortunate for him but also possibly unfortunate for all Bucky/Nat shippers, because instead of having healthy sex with his extremely attractive girlfriend or at least cuddling her in bed, Bucky chooses to brood and monologue about the ghosts of his past. I mean…

These arcs are basically the closest thing we get in comics to the Bucky vibes from The Falcon and the Winter Soldier show, minus Sam, who is just... not here. What we do get initially is Bucky staring into the distance, whispering “I remember them all,” and quite possibly in this timeline at approximately the same time Tony is doing the same dramatic whispering with a nearly identical speech/thought bubble.

Yes, yes, I know I joked about this line belonging to Tony and being given to Bucky, but here’s the actual beautiful winteriron parallel: both of them, simultaneously, are struggling with their past mistakes. Yes, Bucky’s guilt isn’t his fault. Yes, Tony’s guilt is kind of his fault. But I’m calling it: soulmate behavior and winteriron brainrot symmetry at its finest.

Now, about Bucky/Nat. I know I’m biased—deeply, unreasonably biased—but I don’t fully ship them? Like… at all? Even though I love them separately to bits? Yeah, they’re canon. Yeah, there’s chemistry. Yeah, they are still, sorta, going strong in the comic books. Yeah, she shows up in most of these arcs wearing strategically unzipped spy suits, and he’s out here looking like a beefcake with PTSD who is super into that, allegedly, but. Okay. Okay. Hear me out.

They have history, sure. Soviet conditioning, manipulation, sexy espionage nights, all that jazz. But both of them were stripped of agency for most of their lives, and now you want me to believe that makes for a solid romantic foundation?

No, Marvel. That makes for trauma buddies who should’ve stayed very emotionally intense besties without benefits. And yes, I do have a panel of Bucky below doing some next-level brooding on a motorcycle while referring to Natasha as his “best friend,” and if that’s not textbook “we should’ve just stayed friends” energy, I don’t know what is. Please don’t throw tomatoes, this is just a woman’s opinion.

Back to plot: Bucky, Nat, and Namor (that fishy guy in charge of the oceans that I don't care about because DC got Jason Momoa to play Aquaman first) head to Asia and deal with some bad guys. That’s pretty much the whole plot aside from aforementioned brooding and too many (never enough) panels of Nat almost flashing us her behind.

The bad guy in question is someone Bucky had encountered in his Winter Soldier days when he was like… 12 years old or something. Said bad guy is a super-genius with a world-ending virus, and he’s a bit salty since Winter Soldier may or may not have killed someone they love. The bad guy has a plan to use a body of Bucky’s old buddy Human Torch from the 50s (they had one when Bucky was with Steve in the Invaders) to unleash a deadly virus on the world (while, yes, Tony is preventing Mandarin from doing the same with Extremis—and are you seeing what I am seeing here?).

There’s obviously more to this very generic bad guy and very generic bad guy plot, but the key takeaways are that Nat does cool flips, looks flawless, and occasionally side-eyes Bucky’s descent into angst. Bucky wins. World doesn’t end. The virus stays in the plot fridge.

The end.

TL;DR: Before Secret Invasion kicks off, Bucky’s haunted but doing well as Captain America. Nat’s hot but emotionally evasive, sorta. They flirt, fight, presumably do fuck. The whole dynamic is sexy, but mostly friendship-coded with a side of spy kink, and I won’t be convinced otherwise. Bucky clearly wants someone to say, “You’re enough as you are,” and I would like a word with whoever is in charge of making these decisions about why that someone couldn’t be Tony.

Anyway.

That’s it. That’s the recap. Nice arcs. Great art. Solid Bucky development. You should read it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s finally time for Secret Invasion: proper trauma porn, and Tony fucking up so bad he has to resort to turning his entire brain into downloadable content.

How do Marvel Events actually work?

Alright. Quick but necessary explanation I probably should’ve done in Part 1. Because if you’ve ever opened the Marvel Unlimited app (recommended), tried to “just read Civil War,” and suddenly found yourself 26 tabs deep in something called Front Line, you’ve already been here. Welcome to hell. We have tie-ins.

So how do Marvel events work? Well. Every once in a while, Marvel goes, “You know what would be great? Making every superhero’s life miserable at the exact same time.” That’s an event.

Here’s the basic structure: Main Event Run — usually around 5–10 issues, sometimes more. This is the “core” storyline. Think:

Civil War (2006) #1–7

Secret Invasion (2008) #1–8

Fear Itself (2011) #1–7

You can also think of Infinity War—that was an event in the MCU. Everyone gets wrecked, regardless of how well their franchise is doing. Sure, they called it a “phase” or whatever, but an event is where the big bad stuff happens to everyone and overlaps other plotlines: alien invasions, political fallout, exploding cities, Steve dramatically dying (again), Tony spiraling (again), Peter being stuck in the middle (also again), etc.

And you probably sorta get this already, but tie-ins to events specifically are where Marvel interrupts your regularly scheduled programming to say:

“Hi, we know you were enjoying Spider-Man’s personal arc, but now we’re hijacking it to show you what he was doing during this big crossover event. You will be very confused as to what the fuck is going on unless you suddenly subscribe to about a dozen other runs you never had any desire to pay for before. You’re welcome.”

Every major character, side character, and pigeon that’s ever been near a superhero gets a tie-in. Some tie-ins slap (Iron Man, Captain America), some are emotionally devastating (Front Line), some are hot garbage. But they’re all technically canon.

So when I say Secret Invasion had about 98 issues related to it (I counted once, while scrolling), I mean: the main run, a bunch of spin-offs and all those pesky tie-ins.

Am I a well-adjusted person who read all of these once like a sane casual reader? No. I read them three times:

Once for fun, because I love comic books and already finished my list of 100 classic books to read before I die, so everyone can fuck off with it not being an adult hobby (do you know how expensive it is to collect runs that completed decades ago?). Second time a few months ago for a few fic paragraphs, to make sure I got the canon right. And third time for this recap, which is less of a recap now and more like 60% my weak analysis of trauma (and repeating the words trauma, again, and hot too many times), and 40% my unhinged shipping headcanons.

I never claimed sanity. I do, however, claim to have a comic book collection, three fireproof longboxes, and a boarding technique that would make your LCS weep tears of pride—just for this event alone and the event-adjacent other runs. But that’s my cross to bear, I digress. Yes, if this amount of space for only 98 issues is confusing, well… I can’t possibly slot, say, New Avengers into my event without, like… having the whole New Avengers run. So there’s that.

I am not actually going to cover all tie-ins, just what I think is somewhat relevant to Tony and Bucky, for once.

Avengers Groups: Explained Poorly but Accurately Enough, I Hope

Okay, now that you do suspect I’m a bit crazy, let’s clear something up before Marvel gaslights you into thinking there’s only one “Avengers” team in comic books. Here’s the cheat sheet for this specific stretch of time:

Mighty Avengers

The Clean-Cut Government-Approved Avenger Experience led by our professional mess, Tony.

Includes: Carol Danvers, Ares, Wonder Man, Sentry, and others whose names I keep forgetting because they never seem to be around when Tony is having a breakdown and needs a hug.

New Avengers

The Underdog, Off-the-Grid, “We Don’t Follow Your Rules” Vibes Team—essentially Steve’s resistance crew.

Led by: Luke Cage, and occasionally (they come and go), featuring Spider-Man, Wolverine, Jessica Jones, and Doctor Strange. Clint’s around—I'll tell you about him banging Wanda in a second (whoops, let it slip too early).

Basically, they’re the scrappy, emotionally exhausted, chaotic little brother of the Avengers world. And yes, for those who’ve seen Thunderbolts, I just need Marvel to call Sam’s team the Mighty Avengers and my life will be complete.

There’s actually a new New Avengers run planned? Bucky’s on the cover. Arrrr. I can’t wait.

So… let’s assume that just before Secret Invasion, Tony is running S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Mighty Avengers, and Bucky is Captain America and mostly aligned with New Avengers vibes—though he’s not technically with them where we left him before Secret Invasion and is mostly doing his own thing as Cap while also doing Nat, who works for Tony. Neither team seems to know jack shit about what the other one’s doing 90% of the time, though Tony does spend a lot of time trying to talk his pals on the other side into giving up already and coming back to him.

It does involve the New Avengers sitting very quietly inside Strange’s magicked-to-look-like-crap mansion and pretending they are not home while Tony is standing outside with a small army, scratching on the door like a sad rejected puppy and asking for Peter to come out. I am not kidding.

Back to more important things: it is now canon in my brain (and it was planted there by the evil mastermind known as @massivespacewren) that during this exact post–Civil War, pre–Fear Itself period, Tony and Bucky were absolutely having a secret relationship. Like, think about it: Tony helps him, even though they’re on opposite sides / they’re both grieving Steve / they’re both emotionally compromised on the account of feeling too much guilt, weaponized hot, and need someone on their side privately who just wants them for them / neither of their respective teams knows where they’re going at night or why they keep showing up with mysterious bruises and better moods (Ugh… fine, this is pure headcanon, whatever.)

Still. Tell me that’s not peak forbidden romance setup. Tell me that’s not operationally inconvenient, emotionally catastrophic, and deeply sexy. You can’t. You won’t. Right?

Anyway… now that you understand how events work (not that you didn’t before, after I alluded to this about 20 times), that Marvel dabbled in money-grabbing before Disney, and how the Avengers are more of a rotating trainwreck than a team, you’re ready to tackle Secret Invasion. Good for you. Keep reading. You know you want to.

Secret Invasion Event

When I didn’t say but very much implied that tie-ins can joyfully fuck themselves with a chainsaw, I meant it. I wasn’t exaggerating—and yes, I meant it with the full force of a person who has willingly, repeatedly, and stupidly read every tie-in to Secret Invasion, not once, not twice, but three times. That’s… not dedication so much as a personal obsession I’ve accepted. I’m not putting you through that insanity. Instead, I’m giving you a bite-sized recap of how it kicks off and what you actually need to know.

Well—bite-sized by my standards, and if you want to know more, just… read comic books or something.

So, let’s begin, like I always do, with someone emotionally repressed and traumatized making it everyone else’s problem.

Clint comes back from the dead.

This was pre–Civil War business (long story, Wanda killed him) but, as I’ve repeatedly pointed out, nobody commits to permanently dying in comic books. So, here he is, very much alive again.

After checking in on the emotional wreckage of his friends, Clint finds Tony, chats briefly about the concept of being Captain America, politely declines, and then goes off to find Wanda. To clarify, this happens just before Tony chokes on Bucky’s super-thighs and slaps that shield on him.

Now, what Wanda’s up to is happening in a completely unrelated comic I didn't read, because, contrary to what it looks like, I do actually have a personal life, the cutest dog to ever dog and full-time job. But yes, Clint finds her while Tony and Bucky are sadly not banging, bangs her, does not get the closure he’s looking for (since he’s still very much in love with his presumed-dead wife), pops up in Captain America to say hi to Bucky, considers falling in love with him on the spot and moving on just for him, but changes his mind (postpones), and decides to reinvent himself instead.

While Clint was dead for, like, five minutes in comic book years, a spunky gal stole his Hawkeye brand, and Clint’s a giver, so he lets her keep it instead of asking for his shit back. He’s a bit upset with Tony, just like everyone else, even though he missed entire Civil War and has no fucking leg to stand on, so he heads off to Asia with the New Avengers (Luke Cage, Peter, Spider-Woman, et al.), wearing a mask, wielding a sword, and being unnecessarily sexy about it as Ronin.

While in Asia, they fight Elektra, they kill Elektra, and then her body turns into what I can only describe as a very unattractive green alien lizard-zombie thing. Not even the weirdest thing that’s happened in 616, but there’s usually a bit more lead-up when a popular (ish) character like Elektra dies and is then revealed to be an alien. So this is the moment the New Avengers take a collective shaky breath and go, “What the actual fuck?”

That’s when the event kicks off.

Spider-Woman (whose arc in 616 is wildly underappreciated, btw) promptly fucks off with the Skrull-Elektra corpse, finds Tony back in his bedroom in New York (not for a sexy, slightly complicated Avengers hookup… this time) but to drop the suspicious-looking dead lady in Elektra’s clothes on his floor and ask, him being Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the guy allegedly in charge of Avengers with a big, government-approved A, what exactly he plans to do about it.

I am not a mind reader, and while Tony—who, at this point, has been holding his career together with sheer delusion and willpower, who does not need this job, who is increasingly unsure whether the clout was worth the collapse of every meaningful relationship in his life—gets out of bed, I can only hope he at least starts to wonder if he should’ve opened a winery in Malibu instead of becoming America’s scapegoat-in-chief.

But, yk, he does get involved. Of course.

Which brings us to…

Who the hell are Skrull and what their deal is?

Green. Shapeshifting. Space assholes. That’s the short version.

The longer one is that they are a race of green-skinned, pointy-eared alien shapeshifters from a planet called Skrullos (come on, Marvel, you can do better than that). They’ve been around in comics since the 1960s, which means they’ve had decades to cause a bunch of bullshit.

They can look like anyone, down to DNA-deep impersonation. I mean, it’s not the shittiest power. You want to be Tony? Cool, now you are. You want to be Peter and perfectly mimic his resting trauma face and bubble-butt? Sure, go for it. The Skrulls started out as just one of many alien races Marvel cooked up to make the Avengers’ lives harder, but then they got kinda interesting and actually got good plotlines. Their history is unclear on some points and clearer on others, but basically for the purposes of this event:

The Skrulls once had an empire.

Then their shit got blown up.

Then they got very religious and very desperate.

Then they said, “Hey, let’s infiltrate Earth by pretending to be their heroes and sow paranoia even though… we could probably just invade.”

Which… I mean, it is still a much better plan than to keep cloning superheroes for plot reasons (cough, Thor, cough, Steve).

And Skrull are not actually always evil by default, but Secret Invasion makes sure you think they are. If someone was a crazy-obsessed lore-hungry lunatic, one might know by now that there are good Skrulls, bad Skrulls, sexy Skrulls (hi, Teddy), and just deeply tired Skrulls who don’t want to shapeshift into your dad anymore and would rather go back to pretending to be cats in Brooklyn.

But in this specific arc they’re mostly fanatical religious terrorists with a God Complex and a master plan called “He Loves You” (the he is God, or possibly Reed Richards who they used for evil purposes, depending on how cracked your interpretation is). So yeah. They infiltrate Earth. They replace a bunch of heroes and hero-adjacent individuals—some A-list, some Z-tier (RIP whoever was pretending to be Dum Dum Dugan), and sit quietly in the background for years, waiting to strike.

In addition to their normal shape-shiffting thing they’ve got going on for them, in Secret Invasion, they’ve upgraded. They’re not just Skrulls anymore—they’re Super-Skrulls? Which somehow means they have composite powers of multiple heroes. Essentially, imagine fighting a guy who’s Spider-Man, Wolverine, Cyclops, and has Carol Danvers’ energy blasts. Now imagine there’s 20 of them. Now imagine Tony—poor, trying so hard, nobody loves him anymore Tony—emotionally compromised and under pressure, trying to tell who’s real and who’s a lizard in Steve Rogers’ pants (who, duh, is still dead).

I personally both loved and hated this event, because literally anyone could be a Skrull. That sexy panel of Natasha? Could be Skrull. That dramatic moment where Sue Storm leaves Reed in Civil War and tells him about an oily fish dinner? Actually is? That villain who suddenly got a redemption arc? Guess what. Essentially, the main reason not to love this event is that if you care about canon and character development, especially given the clusterfuck that was Civil War… well, fuck you, your favorite character might not even be the real person. So, the basic wisdom of this event, as it stands is: trust no bitch, she might be Skrull.

Main Secret Invasion Event

While we’re talking about Secret Invasion—because Tony deleting his entire brain (god, I hate that phrase too) is a direct consequence of what goes down during this event—you are not going to get a lot out of me (again, by my standards).

Unlike Civil War, which I lovingly dissected like it was a frog in a high school lab, I’m not as emotionally invested in giving you the full play-by-play for everyone involved. So here’s me speed-running through most of it until we hit the juicy Bucky content, because, let’s be honest, that’s why we’re all here anyway.

The main event has 8 issues. Issue #1 opens strong with Tony’s meltdown arc, Season 87, things kicking off in the Savage Land. You might remember that place from that one amazing ’90s X-Men cartoon with the dinosaurs and inexplicably shirtless Charles Xavier. This is where a Skrull ship lands, so, both the New Avengers and Mighty Avengers decide to crash the party.

And just a quick side note while we’re at it: while this group of unrealistically hot people is off playing jungle lizard whodunnit, Skrulls are already running amok around the globe too. People are turning mid-sentence, Tony’s tech is getting absolutely wrecked by alien malware, S.H.I.E.L.D. is compromised, satellites are offline, and somewhere there’s probably a Skrull that was pretending to be you, stopping drawing hearts on the poster of Sebastian Stan and getting to work.

Both Avenger squads show up in the Savage Land with maximum distrust, immediately run into each other like exes in the same shop aisle, both thinking they totally had the right to be there first, some yelling happens, insults are exchanged, and everyone is kinda sweaty until the Skrull ship dramatically opens and spits out a lot of heroes.

Including Steve, which is not cool, Marvel. And Peter, who is already there, making the whole situation extremely awkward and extra uncool. No one knows who’s real, everyone is sus, the vibe is mostly paranoia, and Clint has a full-on oh no my dead wife is alive but what about Bucky moment when Bobbi Morse steps out looking sexy but possibly lizard-coded. It’s emotional. It’s also probably a Skrull.

Issue #2 is technically not filler, but it sure does feel like everyone in the Savage Land just woke up, had a group panic attack, and decided violence was the best love language. We’re deep in jungle fever now—with everyone, yes, sweaty, pissed, and staring down their dead friends in the world’s worst family reunion. Like I said, the Skrull ship has popped like a horrifying piñata full of imposters. Some of them look like old-school Avengers, some are presumed-dead exes, and others are “please God no” duplicates of people who are already standing there. And they all think they are the real deal. Spider-Man vs Spider-Man standoff freaked me out, and is literally the only thing that could make his life worse than it already was. (Besides, you know, One More Day. But we don’t talk about that anymore.)

Teams split into smaller groups to punch each other because you can’t keep stuffing 50 people into a single panel, and paranoia hits a ten. Outside the Savage Land, the rest of the world is still watching S.H.I.E.L.D. crumble, big scary spaceships land and the general question floating about is: “Are we about to get bent over by our new scaly overlords?”

Issue #3 is gutting. It’s trust no bitch, take 3—but now with the addition of not trusting your butler. The issue itself is also a banger. I love it. Peak chaos.

So. Everything’s blowing up. S.H.I.E.L.D. is fully compromised, strategic facilities around the globe are detonating like it’s clearance week at Doomsday Depot, no one knows what the fuck is happening, including the reader who is now losing track of who is alien and who is not, refusing to believe, and the only consistent thing is that literally everyone is accusing each other of being lizards.

Like—Maria gets called out for possibly being a Skrull purely because she’s competent, organized, and doesn’t flirt with Tony. Which, in 616 logic, is apparently suspicious behavior. She’s also a robot who gets very much beheaded. Long story, all good there. But the biggest betrayal of all is Jarvis. My sweet, soft-spoken, murder-capable butler is also a Skrull. The betrayal cuts deep, and this is why we can’t have nice things.

Tony, for the moment, doesn’t know he needs to start looking for another British emotional support blanket, and is hiding in a cave in Savage Lands. No, really. Tony, billionaire genius futurist, is once again dying in a dinosaur-infested jungle cave. He has no Wi-Fi, his Extremis is crashing harder than his social standing post–Civil War, and his fancy suit might as well be made of wet cardboard. Then—just to add insult to internal bleeding—Spider-Woman walks in. You’d think: “Oh, cool, someone here to help and finally give him a hug.” No. Absolutely not.

She slinks in all sultry and suspicious, looks him dead in the eyes, and says something that sounds awfully similar to: “Hi babe. You’re one of us. Surprise! Congrats! You’ve done so well! Mommy Skrull is proud.” The Skrull Queen claiming that Tony—the man who already hated himself more than the public does—is the greatest Skrull weapon of all time is just…

You know what? For a second there, it makes sense, and would explain a bunch of things and his recent fuck-ups. But no… they just let Tony be Tony, that’s all. Which is somehow worse. Give him enough rope, a registration act, and control over national defense systems, and boom: StarkTech in everything and the Skrulls are waltzing in—all thanks to the damaged but still very lovable unintentional war crime with facial hair I don’t approve of in these runs.

Issue #4 is somehow both eventful as hell and weirdly filler-adjacent, in that a bunch of important shit happens, but also half of it is setup for the finale and the other half is just everyone still being sweaty and confused. Tony is still not enjoying his caving experience, looking like he’s just lost a three-way fight between a Skrull, his nervous system, and the concept of self-worth. Thankfully, Nat kicks in cave’s non-existing door, with guns blazing and hair immaculate, delivering the closest thing Tony gets to aftercare in, like, a decade of comic books. She scares the Skrull Queen away, sees Tony mid-breakdown, and is like, “Jesus Christ, you look like shit.” Then she shoots him up with adrenaline, because she’s awesome like that.

Back on the mainland, Nick Fury finally crawls out of his hidey-hole, just after finishing binge-watching all of Netflix and is now ready to kick some things. He’s got a new crew, a trench coat, and approximately zero time for anyone’s bullshit. Thor shows up too, back from the dead, officially. Not a clone. Not a Skrull. I don’t actually remember why, but I assume it happened in his comic book. The point is, the big blond thunder daddy is back and is descending from the sky to say, “Alright, who the fuck broke Midgard?”

I don’t know if Bucky found out about Skrull on TV or opened his door in New York to find a Skrull on his doorstep trying to sell him girl scout cookies, but he’s joining the fight too and doesn’t currently know how much trouble Tony is in.

Issue #5 is… kinda skippable. It's the narrative equivalent of holding your breath and hoping nobody asks if you’re a Skrull. The Skrulls decide it's time to go full reality TV and broadcast a heartfelt global message starring Tony, a few random politicians (lol, "trusted officials"—Marvel, be serious), and a touch of “we come in peace” bullshit. Classic intergalactic gaslighting, now with better production value. Shockingly, some civilians buy it and start chanting “Take us!”—which is maybe kink, maybe cowardice, but definitely not the way to be saved.

Issue #6 has Thor, Tony, and Bucky-Cap gracing the cover, which is the stuff of dreams for me, honestly. Thor and Bucky share a weirdly intimate, testosterone-heavy moment where Thor’s like “Who the hell are you?” and Bucky’s like “America’s rebound, nice to meet you.” Meanwhile, Tony is still out here having a crisis inside a crisis, his Extremis all but useless, but also gearing up to save the world while nearly dead again. For the love of God, someone hug this man already. Or at least offer him a sandwich and tell him he’s doing okay.

The rest of the issue is just Marvel flexing every team-up they’ve got. New Avengers, Mighty Avengers, Young Avengers, probably someone's cousin from the West Coast Avengers—all yeeted onto a battlefield in New York. The Skrulls are out here led by Queen Veranke, who is still doing her sexy Spider-Woman cosplay, and the issue ends with the general vibe of it’s everybody-vs-everybody-else-but-green and “Avengers Assemble!” energy. It’s very symbolic post-Civil War, it is. I just wish they didn’t touch Jarvis, that was a low blow.

Issue #7 is 90% punching, 10% emotional damage, and 100% shipping fuel if you’re feral enough (hi, it’s me). The big battle’s in full swing now, and we finally get a panel with Tony, Bucky, and Peter all in the same frame—which, if you know me at all, is basically my OT3 doing a full-body naked Eiffel Tower in my brain. We eat.

Tony is grumbling that his suit’s duct tape, since Extremis is toast. He mentions it while punching bad guys, and then Bucky—who is surprisingly tender when he wants to be—looks at him and goes: “Go fix yourself. This isn’t the place for—damn!”

Now.

I’m not usually the type to hallucinate ships out of nothing (bold lie, moving on), and I’m sure someone out there will claim “He just meant Tony was complaining and Bucky just needed him in top shape to fight,” but no. No. Because this isn’t just a professional concern. This is “I’m trying really hard not to say ‘baby’ in front of the Avengers.”

There’s a pause. A cut-off word. That’s comic book language for feelings, people. He might as well have whispered, “Get to safety, love, I’ll hold them off,” and slapped Peter on the ass just to make Tony jealous.

Panel included. Because I’m a giver too. You’re welcome.

While you rejoice and want me to shut up already to scroll to that panel, we cut to Jessica Jones, who has been hanging around for a while like a relatable, exhausted mom trying to finish one (1) cup of coffee before a new level of shit hits the fan. She’s mostly been off-panel burping the cutest baby in the Marvel universe, which she made with Luke Cage, obviously. Power couple. Literally. But now, while sipping her juice and watching the Skrullpocalypse unfold on basic-ass cable, she clocks her man Luke out there getting his ass handed to him and goes, “Yeah, no.”

She panics. She tears up. And in the ultimate I’m-a-bad-bitch-and-a-bad-mom-sometimes-too move, she grabs her jacket, tosses the infant at Jarvis, and fucks off to join the battle. Yes. You read that correctly. She leaves the actual, literal Avengers baby—the Marvel equivalent of America’s Next Hope—with Jarvis, who, friendly reminder, is currently a Skrull, which we know and are crying about.

So, good issue. While Jessica is off joining her man in battle, Bucky is here being a supportive, leather-clad husband, telling Tony to “go fix yourself” while casually sticking around to bodyguard Peter—the traumatized child they co-parent via mutually unresolved guilt or, like, do other unspeakably awesome things to, since he’s—I am tired of saying this to everyone—not underage in 616 (dude was married) and, since it’s about time you all quit it, is also not underage in the MCU anymore. Starker, winterspider, and winterironspider for life, every ship is valid. I give you SamBucky, Stony and Stucky in equal measures, give me that.

So let’s break that down:

Jessica says, “I see my man suffering—I’m going in.” Bucky sees his man suffering—says, “I’ll take care of our kid while you go put some make-up on, darlin’.” Jarvis is in the kitchen being like, “Would now be a bad time to reveal I’m not actually me?” The symmetry is gorgeous. The emotional neglect is peak Marvel. And the shippy content is everything you want it to be.

Issue #8 is where the event technically “wraps up,” as in, we won—but at what fucking cost? The Skrulls go down, the planet is saved, sure, whatever, congratulations Earth—but emotionally this issue breaks Tony over its knee like a cheap broomstick. The final kill shot doesn’t even come from one of our main heroes. Norman Osborn is who gets the last shot in on Queen Veranke, who is already dying anyway. And that one move—that one media-perfect, camera-ready “hero” moment—is all it takes for the world to decide he is the new face of heroism. As opposed to Tony and everyone else who busted their ass and didn’t roll in at the last minute like the criminal with greasy hair and government connections and the moral compass of Elon Musk he is.

One last Skrull ship opens its door on the battlefield (because drama), revealing the real Dugan, real Spider-Woman, real Jarvis, and real Bobbi and some other real folk. It's supposed to be a big moment—yay, everyone who was a Skrull is now not a Skrull and are technically back, just missed the last few however long—but the only one who really gets anything good out of this is Clint, who starts making out with Bobbi immediately. That is, of course, until Bucky becomes emotionally available for some mutual pining in Hawkeye and Winter Soldier run, which I really should cover one day, ‘cause Tales of Suspense slap.

And while Jessica and Luke promptly realize that their baby has been kidnapped…

Tony. Is. Ruined.

He’s bruised. He’s exhausted. He’s so happy to see Thor again—you can literally feel the baby-hope coming off him in waves. He’s already smiling, already probably planning post-battle shawarma and a group therapy invite—and then Thor tells him to fuck off. Just, “No, you don’t get to be part of this.”

And then everyone walks away. Yup. Every hero on the battlefield, including Bucky, turns their back on Tony. Like he didn’t just risk everything (again). Like he didn’t just crawl through this entire event bleeding from the brain and still trying to fix everything.

And look—I’m not saying this is the moment that broke him, but if Tony was still on the fence about deleting his own brain before this? Yeah. This is the last straw. He’s lost his rep, lost S.H.I.E.L.D., lost the narrative, and now he’s lost his people what feels like for good.

Which leads us—seamlessly, tragically—into World’s Most Wanted and Dark Reign, which I’m going to skim past because if I don’t, this recap will hit 15k and nobody is that committed to reading my shit unless it involves actual smut. Not that I have any illusions that anyone’s still reading this except maybe Googlebot and the 2.5 mutuals who also cry about 616 Tony at 2AM, but I’m stubborn as hell and I need this finished—for me. Because I have plans. I have fics. I have so many winteriron and others ideas shoved in my notes app related to 616 I will die on this hill.

So… we keep going. Just for a few more issues and the brain deletion. But, like, we sprint, okay?

Invincible Iron Man (2008–2012) #8–#19.

Or, as it will be known from now until the solar death of the internet: Brain Damage Is a Love Language.

Note: The first 7 issues of this run feature Tony still as Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. pre–Secret Invasion, with Issue #7 featuring both Tony and Peter on the cover—for my brand of perverts—but we’re gonna skip those, because they’re not that relevant.

So here we are, post–Secret Invasion, and boy, are things just peachy. By “peachy,” I mean Tony has been very publicly fired, S.H.I.E.L.D. has been deleted from the timeline for the foreseeable future, and Norman Osborn—yes, the former Green Goblin—is now in charge of national security. He’s renamed the operation H.A.M.M.E.R. after firing everyone else, which everyone from the MCU probably finds at least a bit confusing (the name)—since, what about Justin? Idk, nobody cares.

Tony is not coping well, sure, and he’s once again been abandoned by everyone. He’s been ousted as Director, publicly humiliated, accused of handing Earth to the Skrulls (it wasn’t entirely his fault, okay?), and now Norman “I Put the Creep in Creepypolitics” Osborn is breathing down his neck demanding the superhero registration database. You might wonder why he needs it, but Norman has an uncomfortable fixation on Spider-Man that will make Quintin Beck seem very subtle and boyfriend-material, and if Norman can’t bang Peter, he at least wants to fuck him up—or, at minimum, know his legal name.

If you’ve been paying attention, you might recall that during One More Day (gross), Peter traded his marriage and the knowledge of his secret identity to Mephisto for Aunt May’s life, like the messy Catholic masochist that he is. So now no one remembers he unmasked during Civil War, not even Tony. This is prime Starker identity-porn brainrot territory—Tony doesn’t remember Peter’s face, but there’s this haunting familiarity, this vibe, this urge to protect the mouthy little spider. Delicious. But this is not about Peter, so this is all you get on this for now. (Pause for mournful sigh from the Starker corner.)

So, this is the real start of Norman’s Dark Reign era: Tony disgraced, on the run, hated by everyone, but still hot and surprisingly functional until becomes a lot less functional but remains hot even when in a coma. We are nearly there, I know you are tired.

So while Peter is swinging around anonymously again and Norman is salivating over his IP address, Tony is quietly deciding to erase his memories from existence. Because that’s what you do when:

Your public image is in the toilet

Your tech has been compromised

You’re personally holding the most dangerous database in the world inside your brain

And literally everyone you love has left you or been brainwashed or died

As in: Tony takes one look at the hellscape that is Norman Osborn’s Dark Reign, knows he’s about to be officially hunted, and goes, “You know what might fix this? Me, but less,” and starts planning his brain deletion.

Like… is this him giving up? Is this him taking a mental health day? Is this a long-overdue vacation into clinical dissociation? I am honestly unsure—it’s a bit unclear. All I know is, he thinks wiping his brain like it’s a crusty hard drive is a good idea, and unfortunately, nobody can stop him.

Now, to be fair, Pepper and Maria both try to talk him out of it. They give him the whole “Tony, sweetie, maybe don’t” routine. But their voices of reason are quickly overridden by the even louder voice of comic book logic, which says: yes, deleting your own memories to protect the superhero registry from Norman Osborn is a totally normal decision. It’s also extremely yummy when it comes to angsty fanfiction follow-ups, so we are gonna call this a splendid move on his part, cool?

Anyway, here are some greatest hits from this extremely questionable arc:

Tony leaves Stark Industries to Pepper, but then tops it by giving her her own Iron Man suit, because apparently you can’t be CEO of SI without having a repulsor of your own.

He also bangs her goodbye. As in, “Sorry I’m about to erase my personality, wanna hook up real quick?”

Then Tony gives the only backup of his brain to Maria Hill and pretty much tells her, “Take this to the one man I trust with my entire mind.” Maybe not in those words, but sending his chance to ever wake up again to Bucky has to mean something, right? Let’s pause and feel that. Bucky. Who Tony, allegedly, met only a handful of times. Like… Maria is there. She could just hold onto the drive. But… no. Give it to Bucky. Do I even need to say more here? How are there not, like, 10000 fanfics about this?

Then, of course, Tony bangs Maria goodbye too. Which I’m honestly fine with because it’s weirdly sexy, but also a clear sign that the brain deletion is working and we’ve officially entered the “Tony regresses emotionally to horny self-destruction” portion of the arc. For further clarity, the brain deletion is not instant, hence all the random banging, not that it’s not already Tony’s brand.

To my extreme disappointment, this whole storyline is not just “Tony on the run, being clever.” I wish. It’s Tony getting increasingly dumber by the issue, Maria losing her mind trying to keep the backup safe and delivered, Pepper doing something I really couldn't be arsed mentioning, and Norman Osborn looming like an asshole he is, making his crush on Peter everyone’s problem. It all culminates with Tony finally going full potato, Norman about to kill him, and then having to back off because it’s being broadcast live on TV.

By the end of the arc, Tony doesn’t get fully dead, but does fall into a coma, Norman doesn’t get his database, Bucky is doing Bucky things and about to properly team up with New Avengers, Peter included, and that’s the big ending of the World’s Most Wanted arc which will be promptly followed by actual panels of Bucky standing over Tony’s unconscious body and resisting the urge to hold his hand.

And that—that’s where I leave you. Also where I left you in my fanfic, since my refreshed canon knowledge and my AO3 published shit like to meet at the exact same tragic midpoint. Sorta.

I’ll be doing some more comic reading this weekend, so expect another recap soon, my trusty Googlebot. Later.

P.S. Yes, I’m including the panel of Tony banging Maria—not just because I’m weirdly into it (I am), but because Marvel gave us a full visual of Tony going at it against a wall and this needs to exist on the interwebs.

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dilutedconfusion · 3 months ago

Text

A Moth to a Flame

Eustass Kid x F!Reader (Part 6)

Heyyy so yeah…it’s me again. This is not an old post or a repost or anything like that. I am back like a year later still obsessed with Kid and still continuing this fanfic because it’s my baby and I love it (despite some of the old chapters making me cringe a little lol). So basically what happened was college and life REALLY got in the way, but lately I’ve had more time and finally THANK THE FUCKING LORD got out of my writers block. Like seriously I was so stuck on where to go with this fanfic I rewrote certain sections a bunch of times. But here I am and I plan to try to keep this up once again. Soooo expect more from me (specifically the last chapter of Lost Star if you even remember that fic that Im soooooo close to finishing).

For your reading pleasure and because its been forever Imma give a but more in depth summary of PREVIOUS chapters before talking about this one itself.

SO SPOILERS AHEAD PLEASE GO READ THE OTHER CHAPTERS BEFORE THIS RECAP!!! This is just for returning readers who may have forgotten.

RECAP: Okay so if we remember Y/N lives on an island in the New World. Her life is boring but she tries to make it fun by both drawing constantly and being reckless (I know what a fun combo). Kid literally just got his arm blasted off about a week ago. Little to say but he’s been a bit grouchy since then and because of that him and Killer have been on the rocks. Y/N out of curiosity decides to follow the pair once they take to land on her island for supplies. Kid and Y/N chat, she does something stupid like falling right into the damn ocean, he saves her. She wakes up on his ship and is NOT doing well mentally. Kid freaks out, basically publicly bullies her but lo and behold her Dad, who may not or may be someone special, shows up at the scene of the crime. All long with the entirety of Kids crew just standing there awkwardly.

Summary: Y/N finally has some semblance of dignity and stands up for herself. Kid doesn’t like that, but guess what? He actually sorta realizes what a little freak he was being. Kid and Killer finally talk about it instead dodging the issue for the millionth time which means some big emotional trouble for the lads. Y/N realizes she misplaced something, something rather important. Killer starts to scheme and may or may not totally ship it. But all the while Y/N’s worst nightmare is looming closer.

Warnings: Mentions of blood, Killer being freaky lol

Word Count: Like 10-11k I think, this shit huge

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

Tags: @st4rfevrr @archangelshavethetardis @likeeliterallywtf-archived @tremendoushorsepatrolgoth @thesnailus @shamblespirate @gabi-moureira @ferretsqueen @karmadglory @dreamistsblog

(Also I realize again it’s been HELLA LONG since I last posted. But I still tagged the people who wanted to be tagged, but if you would not like to be tagged anymore no problem just ask! I get it lol)

Seeing you up on that boat was odd for him. Odd in the way one might find a chess piece in a checkers box. Or a tree on the world’s smallest island in the middle of the ocean. Not impossible, surely, but that thought didn’t stop him from remembering something he hadn’t thought about in years.

His saliva turned to acid and his throat the barrel of a gun. Throwing out scorching breaths that had him kneeled over in pain.

You were young. Short enough to get fully engulfed by the putrid man that was holding you. His mask was void of any emotion yet he could nearly see that sadistic smile. Your hair a mess of blood as you struggled against his large arms.

Your father caught a spare glance of you that night before everything changed. One reflective bright glare of fire in your eyes and tears so full of life and emotion. If that moment was a painting it would be praised. But his life wasn’t one he wanted to be documented. Not anymore. Not with this shame.

Because only a bastard like him could have a doomed child like you.

“Y/N tell me what’s going on.”

Before he could let himself sink into the past he needed to realize you weren’t pleading for your life. Not clawing or caked in blood. His eyes catched the shining gleam of sweat on your brow. The way your eye bags sunk a little lower and your hair seemed out of control. But it was the bandages on your hands that worried him the most. You weren’t standing up fully, as if hunkered over in shame. Face red with an emotion he couldn’t quite make out.

Is that…fear or embarrassment?

Before you could speak, your mouth already hanging open to reply, the redhead cut you off. “Dad?!” Kid leered between you and this supposed man that was your father. Looking down at your hand on his forearm in disgust before ripping it away and quickly walking up to the edge of the banister. Your cheeks flushed up an even brighter red, swallowing down the solid rock that was seemingly in your throat to follow after him. Kid stood there giving the man a speculative snarl as he spoke to you. “This man is your father? Did he come here to save his helpless little baby?”

You glared at him almost instantly. Smacking a hand into his right arm which nearly sent smoke to spew out of his ears. “Don’t talk to me like that!”

She…smacked him? Your father was trying to piece the scenario together. One that made sense with both your injuries, blushed face, and the fact that you hadn’t come home last night. He was expecting to see you screaming for his help if you were injured.

I mean clearly these men hurt her right?

Kid didn’t have a moment to retaliate against your slap because in an instant he heard rocketing steps in the air. His eyes met your fathers as he watched him skywalk up onto the deck. The crowd of Kid pirates below briskly put down their supplies and drew their weapons. The faint clang of guns getting loaded and swords being unsheathed causing him no alarm. As the slightly gray haired man landed you in front of you, you felt a wave of relief. With Killer promptly getting his blades out and ready, Kid stayed still. Sizing up the man with an unblinking glare as he turned towards him.

With all the weapons pointed at your father you couldn’t help but make haste. Stepping in between the space between your father and Kid. “Everyone chill out! I’m being serious, put down your weapons, everything is fine!”

Seeing you red and yelling like that sent a little smile to Kids lips. Eyes flickering to your palm now facing him as if that would do anything to stop him. “Don’t tell my crew what to do, brat.”

Your father took a bounding step forward. His heavy boot slamming against the deck authoritatively. “Don’t talk to my daughter like that! Y/N what happened here? Why are you injured and with these idiots?”

Before you could even speak, mouth hung open and head turned back towards your father you were cut off yet again. “Idiots? That’s big talk coming from a short man.”

Kids voice sounded like nails on a chalkboard to you as he spoke up. “Kid shut up! You’re making things worse.”

Kid didn’t like that. Well that was to be expected but he couldn’t handle anymore of this outright disobedience against him. You were a pest and he needed you to know that. “You’re telling me to shut up? Little miss I can’t fucking do anything for myself and need my daddy to come save me. Yeah right. Step aside. If this old geezer wants a fight he’s getting it.”

With Kids attitude the crew started to murmur from below. Some left standing clutching their weapons, others climbing up the side onto the deck. Pacing sideways to take up the space behind Kid and beside Killer. But what people didn’t notice, simply because they couldn’t with the man’s face covered in a mask, was Killer squinting his eyes at the old man in confusion.

It wasn’t like him to draw his weapon and not be completely enthralled in what was happening. That was required of him simply for the fact that him and the surrounding crew could die in a moment of hesitation like that. But here he was, ears almost ringing softly as the world around him became muffled. That girl and Kid just blurry visages yelling at each other back and forth like always. The crews murmuring and yells egging on the situation from beside him. The only thing perfectly set in his view was this old man, standing there silently, watching over the scene more confused than afraid.

Where do I know this guy from? I…swear I’ve seen him before.

Killer couldn’t quite put his thumb on it and Kid, along with everyone else, wasn’t paying enough attention.

They are watching their favorite soap opera, “Dad Meets His Daughter’s Angry Deranged Boy-toy.”

Without any hesitation seeing as Killer was so unfocused he giggled softly at that. Which of course made the whole crew go completely silent instantaneously.

“Did you just…laugh?” Kid, who in the middle of berating the old man, pivoted his anger towards his next victim. Craning his neck at a visibly painful angle to stare back at Killer.

Killer once again thanked himself for wearing a mask 24/7 cause without it they would’ve seen the blood red tinted all over his tanned cheeks. He left out a awkward little cough, glancing at you and your father who seemed to be giving each other confused looks and shoulder shrugs.

I don't whats weirder, them hearing my laugh or everyones reaction to it.

“No. Of course not.” He said, muscles tightening up once again so he looked a little more ready to fight. His arms at his sides as his blades tipped limply towards the floor.

“Are you making fun of me over there? Is this funny to you?” Kid asked clearly trying to find yet his third victim of unused testosterone and throw it head first at somebody.

I swear I need to buy him a stress toy. The ones where the little eyes pop out so he can get the full experience.

“I mean it’s a little funny, yeah. You yelled at a helpless girl for no reason and almost made her fall off the boat. And now you’re picking a fight with an old man whose main concern should be cataracts, not fighting.” Killer said matter of factly. The crew behind him both laughed a little at Killer’s blatant throw whilst others softly agreed with him.

“Yeah why in the hell are you fighting these people Kid? We don’t even know who the hell they are.” Jaguar, one of the taller crew members, rumbled out. The rest of the crew nodded their heads in response as they stared at Kid expectantly.

Hip, who had been the one to bandage you up late last night stood quietly. Considering the fact that Kid profusely asked her not to mention what had happened and he barely even told her anything, she was in no rush to explain anything to the crew. Keeping her arms folded and her lips tight.

Otherwise the rest of the crew had no idea how this girl had even managed to get on the boat in the first place or why she was wearing their spare clothes.

“Wait, isn’t that the girl from yesterday UK? The one that was on the docks.” Bubblegum piped up, softly elbowing the man next to him as he stared at you.

“Hmmmm…yeah I think so now that you mention it. She looks a little more ugly than before though.” He mumbled, but with ears like yours of course you heard. Your frown deepened as you looked back at him in shock.

“Says the guy who’s built like a fucking onion!” You stepped away from Kid and your Dad, pointing a finger at the man in the crowd.

“Hey don’t call me an onion with your mummy looking ass!” UK roared back, the rest of the crew clamoring with him as their weapons now pointed at you instead of the old man.

“Don’t you dare talk to my daughter like that!” The old man yelled, grabbing you by the shoulders forcing you to take a step behind him like always. You struggled a bit, smacking your fathers hand away but getting pushed back regardless. You tried to pay no mind to him, focusing your attention on the crew in front of you. Considering what just happened earlier with Kid you couldn’t take any more blows to your ego like that.

“Oh now you’re gonna shoot me because I called one guy an onion. What are you a bunch of babies? All of ya’ll like to pretend like you’re some big balled bastards but fucking start squawking like birds the second you meet someone who won’t let you shit on them!”

What once was an uproar became a full yelling contest, the once quiet peaceful boat of the early morning now splitting anyone’s ear who happened to be close by.

At this point, Kid was just standing there in shock. He was angry, sure, but now that it wasn’t all focused on him and his personal beef that made absolutely no sense, he was starting to see how things…may have gotten out of hand.

This isn’t my fault, she deserves this. This random old guy deserves this and I-

He looked back at Killer, who was now just standing there silent at the front of the angry mob, mask trained on the redhead.

Oh I know what he’s thinking. Probably a big fat I told you so and that I let this get out of hand and that I was being completely irrational and how I need to be resting in bed sucking on my thumb like a child.

Kid just grimaced more, the loud yells between you and his crew less ramping up his anger and more just making his head thump in pain. All that tiredness from this morning coming back and but of course his stupid stump throbbing.

He felt the veins on his forehead grow, beating rhythmically on his forehead before he finally couldn’t take it anymore. “EVERYONE SHUT THE FUCK UP!”

And thankfully the ship went silent yet again. Everyone’s eyes snapping towards the red head, but of course the silence didn’t last long.

“Captain this damn broad and geezer need to learn a lesson!”

“Yeah her and that old geezer shouldn’t even be here! They need to pay for even stepping onto the Victoria!”

”I don’t wanna be here, your stupid Captain asked me to leave and then wouldn’t let me! I don’t know you if guys realize this but your Captain is a fucking hormonanlly imbalanced idiot!” You yelled back, looking at the crew once more. There was no way you were going to take the blame for what had happened. If it was up to you, you would’ve been gone already.

“What the fuck did you just call our Captain?” The crew somehow said in unison. If they were pissed before then they were ready to go to war now. Stomping closer to the girl as a herd and weaving around Killer who still stood silently in place staring at Kid.

Kids eyes fluttered around spastically. If he wasn’t suddenly tired he would’ve joined the fight with you calling him ‘hormonally imbalanced’ and all. But with Killers demanding stare on him and this strange sense of shame and even a bit of embarrassment in his gut for what he had done, he really just wanted this over with.

So instead he chose the most agreeable option since his crew would fight to the death for him and you seemed to finally have your balls back with all the yelling. He quickly without thinking too much stomped over to you, slipping behind the old man and grabbing you by the back of your shirt. You hadn’t even noticed him considering you were far to focused on the angry mob to be fair. But one moment you were standing, in the next you were being slid backwards, sending your feet out from under you. You managed to catch yourself from falling but you’re feet kept sliding across the deck with quick speed.

“Hey what the hell? Let go of me!” You tried to spin around and took strong steps on the ground to keep you planted. But you couldn’t move with his grip on your shirt keeping you in place. Eventually he came to a stop, pinning you against the banister with your back to him so he could let go of you. You tried to kick back into him, but he was using his knee and stabbing you right in the spine to keep you in place.

Oh not again. I’m not babying out this time.

“What is with you and pinning me against this stupid banister? I swear to god I'll turn your fucking nutsack into a coin purse you horrid man shaped piece of shit!”

Surprisingly that little comment made him snort. Biting back a laugh and smiling down at her as he craned her head to look at him. “Wow, look who got her bite back. You’d like that wouldn’t you?” He whispered demeaningly. But just when you were about to slip free you felt him slip something in your pocket which immediately sparked out these purple little lines of electricity. It made your skin tingle and before you knew it he let up, removing his knee and taking a step back from you.

“Fucking hell what did you-“

One moment you were standing on the deck and the next you were swung violently 20 feet in the air. In these kind of moments, when you had a crowd watching you really didn’t want to seem like such a wuss. But hanging loosely like a limp cat by your side pocket really did bring out the worse of you.

“OH MY SWEET FUCK PUT ME DOWN!” You tried to grab onto the item in your pocket but the second you tried you got flung violently towards the island at incredible speeds.

Kid, who’s one good hand was still sparkling purple, suddenly stopped. Looking over at the old man who was being held up by the angry crew with a grin on his face.

“Go fetch.”

__________

“How long until we get there?” A woman asked, her voice interested yet pointedly annoyed as if she was just asking the question to bother the stewardess beside her.

“By nightfall according to the captain madam.” The stewardess stood beside her with a straight back. Eyes lingering anywhere else but the woman beside her. The woman sat upon a red velvet chair carried in just for her. Gold tassel accents threaded in its edges that matched the dangling drips of finely threaded gold hanging from her glasses.

If the stewardess wasn’t pointedly uncomfortable she would’ve marveled at the delicate jewelry all along the aging woman. Noticing the fine lines in her face filled with makeup. Bright colors adorning her eyes in the attempt to make her look slightly more welcoming. ”Well they should make haste if they know what’s good for them. Keeping me cooped up in this…” the woman motioned her hands around the large room of the boat, “pigs den! I mean seriously, you’d think they’d provide something a bit more lavish.”

“Well with the short notice this was the closest available ship to make your request madam. I apologize for the lack of amenities.” The stewardess replied, keeping her tone even despite the obvious hatred towards her ship.

I didn’t become a marine to have my very own ship be compared to a pigs den.

“It doesn’t matter, I shouldn’t have had to wait for this disgusting ship to arrive in the first place. I’m on a over decade long mission that those supposed marines should be well informed on. But look! With the death of that horrid man we finally get a chance and yet suddenly all their efforts go to reforming those mindless countries.”

The stewardess stayed quiet. Watching over the woman as she sighed and leaned further back into her chair. A tilted frown on her painted lips. The tips of her sharp heels prodded into the side of her footrest ribs. The footrests face becoming more contorted in pain.

Always obedient. Always silent.

The stewardess thought, again trying to conceal her animosity as she made the effort to refill the woman’s drink once again despite it still being half full. Whatever she could do to stop her nagging she would. Not a single pillow out of place, nor lack of attentiveness showed.

__________

The meeting room, which was also called the observatory, was near the upper deck of the Victoria. The room was circular in shape and had big windows looking out towards the sea. Light blue walls made the room bright and airy. But they were mostly covered by all the hanging picture frames and memorabilia the crew had collected over the years. They kept their most precious items in this room along with maps, treasure chests, and rare artifacts. The room was the most well kept out of all of them though it still had that messy touch of scattered papers and left open books on almost every surface. At the center of the room was a light table surrounded by four lush dark blue chairs, the meeting place for Kids most trusted.

“What the hell was that?” Killer said, after hastily dragging Kid back inside the ship and into their observatory. The rest of the crew had thankfully gone back to work as Kid had ordered. There repetitive sounding footsteps as they hauled boxes from the dock to the lower hull close by. But of course once that girl and her father had disappeared Kid had tried to go grumbling off someplace else. Completely disregarding the confused faces among his crew.

“What do you mean what was that for? I did my job and got rid of her.” Kid stepped into the room, turning back around to stare at Killer as he closed the door. Knowing damn well he didn’t want anyone to hear what was going on.

Killer finally faced towards him, arms crossed over his chest as he stood there, just as demanding looking as he was back on the deck. “That’s not what I mean Kid I meant why did you get up on her like that? I told you I could handle it and you brushed me off like I wasn’t even there.”

“Well if you’d get the shit out of your ears you would’ve heard me say I didn’t need any help.” Kid rolled his eyes at him, almost unconsciously about to cross his arms before he realized he couldn’t. Which of course just made him even more pissed at having to deal with this.

“But we both agreed-”

“Agreed on what? That you think I couldn’t handle it.”

“Kid I need you to stop being a dick for just a minute and listen to me.” This was starting to get to Killer. Scratch that it had been getting to Killer for the past week. But right now it just felt like that cherry on top of an already steaming shit pie. He couldn’t let it go on any longer, he needed to talk about it now. There was no way he was letting something like that happen again.

“I don’t-”

“Kid.” Killer instantaneously cut him off. Quickly taking his hands and grabbing the back of his mask to slip it off. A big puff of his blonde hair and bangs swooped down over his face covering his eyes partly. But he brushed him down a bit to get rid of the hat hair. Holding his helmet at this side as he stared at Kid, his face so serious it could cut glass.

This quickly shut Kid up seeing his first mate like that. Along with the fact that he finally got to see the purple lines underneath the blondes eyes confirming just how tired he was.

“Okay, thank you.” Killer finally started, “What you did earlier was weird okay. You pushed her to the edge of the ship just because you wanted some kind of thank you? I thought you didn’t care about that and wanted her to leave first and foremost?”

“Well you saw the way she was acting. She was being ungrateful and practically about to pass out just from being near us. She was talking about my ship like it had her at gunpoint.” Kid knew he was complaining like a child, but he also knew he was right. She was acting weird the whole time and Killer saw that.

And yet she says I’m the hormonally imbalanced one.

“I don’t know what was wrong with her but you knew she was hurt. We both did. She literally just wanted answers and too leave yet you made a big deal out of it. I get it, she’s a bitch but we both know that wasn’t worth the trouble. Provoking her and her goddamn father like that.”

“You ask me to relax and the minute I find something fun to do you get angry at me.” Kid scoffed, still not willing to cough up the fact that he was starting to feel embarrassed by it too. Since in Kids mind he was just going to pretend like everything he did made sense, it was the easiest way out of this to him.

“What do you mean fun? I know you like proving asshole marines wrong and messing with them but that was just some girl.”

“Quit questioning me, it already happened and we’ll never see her or her father again so what does it matter?”

Classic Kid deflection. ‘It already happened so let’s not talk about it because talking about my feelings is not going to happen.’

Killer sighed, feeling a bout of rage start to bubble in him. “You brushed me off. God, everything you did out there was ridiculous. You went from wanting her gone to practically begging her to stay just so you could have something to yell at. The whole crew nearly started a fight on deck because you were being so unreasonable!”

Shit I didn’t mean to yell. Fuck. Killer knew not to raise his voice at Kid. But with how tired and just overall done with this he felt, there was no stopping it. Biting his tongue he watched how Kid’s face turned from annoyed at talking about it, to annoyed at him in particular. His dark rimmed eyes peering at him.

“Are you telling me I can’t pick fights when I want to? Seriously Killer? And the crew had every right to get angry. She was being a bitch, and her so-called father was just protecting her like the little baby she is. I didn’t instigate that, if anything you should’ve been the one to tell them to back off whilst I was dealing with them!” Kid took a step closer to Killer. Tilting his head slightly and throwing his hand up in the air. Killer of course couldn’t back down, not now after everything. Kid needed to be stopped.

“Well I thought you didn’t want my help. Why the hell would I try to fix your sloppy problems when you acted like I wasn’t even there. We’re a team Kid! We’ve always been a team and I’ve spent my whole life making sure you don’t blow a gasket over stupid shit. But for some reason this time my words aren’t enough? A random girl is the thing that makes you crack?!”

Kids eyes went wide when Killer yelled once again. He never did that. He always used that calm voice of his to settle Kid down. But here he was, just as broken as the man in front of him.

“It’s not like that! It’s not that I wasn’t listening to you, I just didn’t want you controlling me. You’ve been 10 feet up my ass all week, I need to be able to do what I want. I am the Captain aren’t I?!” He wanted Killer to say yes. To put down whatever this was and just let him be. There was no way he was going to stand here and let him talk to him like that. Even if subconsciously he knew he was getting a taste of his medicine.

“Well I’ve been 10 feet up your ass cause you lost your fucking arm Kid! Your literal fucking arm that was once attached your body on your left side if you can’t remember. Or are you so lost that I need to draw you a diagram as to what that means?” Killer flung his hand up in the air. Stepping closer to the red head as his eyes narrowed down on him in anger.

Why is he being like this? What the fuck? Kid almost didn’t know how to respond. Killer had teased him all his life but not like this. Not ever seriously. But here he was, zoned in dead on his face with a look that basically spelled out hatred. If Kid wasn’t so angry, he would’ve immediately been hurt.

“Yeah I for sure as hell need a diagram for the fucking lack of arm that I can feel throb every time you talk to me! Has it ever occurred to you that this isn’t helping? That you getting in the way for even the tiniest of things is a nuisance?!”

“Oh don’t you say that Kid. For all I’ve done for you, for the shit I went through last night and today. Or matter of fact when I saved you from bleeding to death when your arm got shot off.” Killer rubbed his eyes quickly, trying to hold himself back from saying something stupid. But it was on the tip of his tongue and no matter how much he swallowed it down, it dared him to yell it out. So he looked him dead in the eye, and took a step forward, breaching the space between them.

“I have to be like this Kid because if I wasn’t you and your incapable ass would be dead already!”

And that was the sentence that broke the camel’s back. That split the sea in half or caused Pompeii to rupture and kill thousands. But Kid wasn’t about to kill thousands, he didn’t even want to kill the one man in front of him. But it sure as hell took the strength of those thousands to keep him from punching Killer straight in the jaw.

“You did not just say that. Killer, do you seriously think everything I am and all my strength comes from you? That I’d be nothing without you huh? Do you really think that lowly of me? Huh?! DO YOU?!” Kid couldn’t handle it, pressing his pointer finger roughly into the other man’s chest. He was nearly screaming that last part, which meant if the crew hadn’t heard them arguing before, they definitely heard it now.

This immediately caused Killer to panic. He was angry, annoyed, and down right hostile but what he said was wrong. And even though he knew Kid would take it the wrong way, he still had said it. “That’s not what I meant Kid! You’re taking my words and twisting them. I know you can-"

“Shut the fuck up! Matter of fact, get out of here! Get the hell off my ship! If you don’t think that I can handle being by myself then fine. Let’s see how much I need some controlling, nagging, and useless asshole like you!”

The second those words slipped out of Kids mouth he felt the life drain from his whole body. As if somebody has slipped inside him and tore off a piece of soul. Dragging it away as Killer took a step back.

Kid’s mouth hung open to say something, anything, but his fear of looking stupid caused by his horrifically sized ego made him stop. There was no way he was going to back on what he just said. It would make him look like a fool and even more worrisome than that it would prove that he really was off his rocker. That he really was letting his emotions control him and the one person who was perfect at keeping Kid in check, was for some reason staying completely silent.

This silence grew heavy, as if the literal weight of a mountain hung on Kids shoulders. And that feeling only got worse. A crumbling rupture of an earthquake with each and every step Killer made, until eventually he had turned around and completely left the room. That’s when Kid really felt it crack, the fault line splitting completely. Swallowing up the land that held his heart and soul. Lava covered the ground with a searing splash across his cheeks. Fist clenched as it got pinned in place in the soil. There was no reaching for that door to chase after him. No movement at all. But that mountain shook and crumbled inside him. What once was one conjoined land became two separate solitary islands in just a few moments.

The space between them bigger than ever.

__________

After some point you couldn’t handle it anymore. Usually your room was comfortable. A nice place to relax and do whatever you wanted when you pleased. But right now it was a hiding place. Just another hole, box, or carved out corner in a wall for you to hide in. You stared up at the ceiling on your bed, body aches thankfully gone after you downed a gallon of water and some medicine. Along with your parents tag team nagging at you as you changed your bandages. There was no right way to explain to them what had happened so you said it in roundabout ways. Trying to avoid it all together despite how guilty you felt. Until of course your father gave you that look. That piercing look he had given you since you were a child that said tell me the truth as if lying would damn you straight to hell. So you did. You told them about the jetty, the drowning, how those pirates ‘saved’ you, and how you ended up arguing with those men on that ship.

Little to say they were mad, but more then that they were completely and utterly worried. “You can’t…you can’t keep doing things like this. I swear Y/N its like you want to get hurt.” Your mother pleaded out, arms folded across her chest as she stood there with a frown.

“I’m not trying to get hurt and I didn’t mean to fall into the water or whatever happened.”

“Well what did you think would happened when you go walking out there during a storm? You’re not an idiot. I know you’re not an idiot but you keep being so reckless.” Your father, who always had some semblance of faith in you if not regarding all the insistent worrying they both loved to throw up on you, seemed to be taking this slightly better than you imagined. Well frankly anytime the word ‘drowning’ was even uttered near your family it felt uncomfortable for a large sum of reasons the three of you never wanted to talk about ever again. And thats how these kinds of things went, you’d fuck up, say your sorry, they let it slide but little did they tell you that the leash around you was going to get a little bit tighter. You were older now, hopefully straying away from that leash but you knew it was always going to be there because you simply were put on this earth to be something to worry over.

Maybe Kid was right. I am just a baby.

“I know and I’m sorry, okay. I won’t go out there again. I’ll be careful.” You tried to look at both of them as you spoke but your eyes kept fluttering downwards. The floor a much safer place to look at then the disappointment surrounding you.

“Look…I know you’re taking his death hard. We all are. But for you to be acting out and making such horrible decisions like this is putting your life at risk. Who knows? Those men could have just taken you from us and you wouldn’t be here right now. You’d be on a ship of all things.” Your mother looked at you solemnly. She knew about your fear of being on boats. She knew how much you had loved him. Which only made you feel more and more ashamed of everything.

Fucking hell I am stupid. I’ve been trying to ride any high I can get and I just…keep falling back down. What’s wrong with me?

Which led you to where you are now. Your father going silent, your mother wishing you’d let her in. But you’d walked away, shut and locked the door to escape them. You didn’t need a constant reminder of how strange you were. You had already dealt with that your whole life yet here you were dealing with it again.

Your hands traced the bandage on your side. Felt your clothes thankfully changed into something not belonging to those idiots pressed softly against your skin. You were comfortable, yet miserable.

Sounds a lot like my life.

You chewed your lips, trying hard to remember what had happened last night. How you had even gotten there. How in the world those pirates ended up saving you.

I…remember the bar and talking to him. I remember leaving to go home I think. I must’ve ended up going to the beach but why in the hell did I fall in? I’ve never fallen in before, I’m always careful. Unless someone…pushed me in?

That thought made you brows furrow. Why in the world would they have pushed me in, just to save me? Actually why in the world were they over there? You can barely see the jetty from the docks. And it’s just forest around there so there’s no reason to head that way.

You rubbed your eyes, groaning softly in annoyance. Okay well maybe they were meeting someone up over there? But I know everyone who comes in and out of this island. You can’t not know that since the dock is right there. Maybe…there’s some pirate treasure hidden over there? No way in hell, I’ve lived here way too long to not have come across some stupid treasure. Well maybe…they followed me? But Kid was basically begging for me to leave him alone and…Killer seemed more interested in literally anything else but me. I mean I guess he stared at me when their ship first showed up but that’s about it. And why did Kid seem so annoyed when I asked him if he saved me? I mean seriously does he hate me that much that he can’t even take credit for it? Despite me being on his literal ship??

All of these thoughts were really starting to get to you. Jumbling around in your head as you smacked yourself across the forehead wishing you didn’t have seemingly a small case of amnesia. You sat up with a grunt, scooting your ass over to the end of the bed near its left post. Without even paying attention you reached out to grab you satchel, which you always left hanging there in the same exact spot. Except this time you didn’t feel it there. Feeling nothing but smooth cold wood instead of fabric. You did a double take, blinking your eyes as if you were hallucinating before in fact realizing it was there.

“What the-”

Then it hit you like a bag of bricks.

My bag. My stuff. My FUCKING SKETCHBOOK.

You knew you had lost your clothes, seeing as you came home not wearing them. But your bag had completely left your mind. You basically forgot the damn thing existed for the past 6 hours since you woke up. Which meant two things.

It’s either crying for help at the bottom of the sea bed or its….

The second part made your skin crawl.

Oh no. I can’t. I can’t go back there, they will actually try to kill me this time.

When you had first seen that beautiful boat it mesmerized you, but standing on it was a different story and the people on it were even worse.

Maybe if I ask nicely? Or like…pay them? Fucking hell I didn’t even look for it when I woke up.

But you weren’t about to just give that bag up. You needed that sketchbook. It was the damn thing that he had made for you when you were little. You’ve been binding more pages to it ever since because you thought it made your art better. It had everything in it.

Okay…let’s think rationally. I could try to dive for it and grab it. It’s in a waterproof bag so I should be fine. But then you remembered your wounds, which meant of course diving wasn’t an option. Second plan…get someone else to dive and look for it. Fucking who the hell would want to do that? It’s definitely not going to float to shore, that book weighs a ton and it probably got sucked in deeper.

You looked up at the ceiling, thinking heavily in the same way you always did. Okay then I guess if its going to be somewhere I can actually grab it myself…it’s going to be there. Which means I’m going to have to ask myself.

The thought of asking one of your parents to do it grazed across your mind but you halted that thought immediately. I’m the one who got myself into this mess, I’m going to be the one to clean it up.

You quickly shot up. Rushing over to your closet and throwing it open. You kept an extra wad of emergency cash hidden in a small box on the top shelf. Slipping down and coughing up the extra dust that came down with it you opened her up. Sitting on the floor to count bills and at least try to save some of it.

There’s no way I’m giving them all of this. Maybe just a little, like 50…no to low maybe 100? Fucking hell their pirates they are going to be greedy.

So unwillingly you split it into fours and took one fourth of the pile. Shoving it into your pocket and standing up to head out. But before you could reach the door you realized something.

There’s no way they are going to let me out. I’m injured so they don’t want that getting worse nor do they want me near that ship.

You stared at the door for a moment, feeling some guilt come over you. Well it won’t take me too long. I’ll just try and be back right away. Go to the ship, hand them the cash, and go straight home. No biggie. Not a problem.

You knew bad things could happen, like the whole crew still hating your guts and not accepting your money. But you were on your terms now. You didn’t have to get on the boat if you didn’t want to, nor did you have to come unprepared.

So knelt down by your bed, patting your hand around on the warm carpet before you felt the cold and hard metal fill up your hands. It was a pistol your Dad had given you for protection. And despite how unsafe and risky of a person you seemed, you were still a better shot than anyone else on this island.

So you shoved it into the back of your pants, keeping the safety on like always before slipping on a black jacket to cover it up. Then quietly you opened the latch on your window and slipped out into the evening air.

__________

Killer was well…Killer and that meant two things. The first being that he was a soldier of massacre as they called him. The name being right on the nose for exactly what he was capable of and willing to do. The second thing, or the more unlikely thing for people to realize, was he was a softy. He knew that everyone was, even Kid which he so often made fun of at the worst and best of times. But Kid hid it well and to the untrained eye would never notice it if it went unchecked. But Killer, well Killer had problems hiding it. He didn’t just wear this mask because it made him look cool or for the fact that he had some unscrupulous feelings about what he looked and sounded like. He also knew that in the face of danger, sometimes his face could give it away how he felt. That any time his Captain had been hurt or someone on the crew was out of his reach his face contorted into this horrifically sad frown. One that made him look weak despite being anything but. It made sense for him, as the calm more rational half of his Captain to be unreadable as to never give anything away.

But today he realized something strange, like as if the sky wasn’t blue or grass wasn’t green. He realized maybe Kid didn’t view him as much of a half as he did himself. That this connection they’ve had since childhood wasn’t as strong as it once was or maybe it was always like this and he’d never notice. Too lost in the battle, blood, and happiness his crew brought him.

These thoughts were strong as he walked but no one would have noticed. He wasn’t going to slump over or cry out in pity as he walked through the town. He was inconspicuously sad, showing exactly what he wanted to show at all times. So when he went to the bar for a drink, the same one he had been to the previous night, no one noticed. Even when the bartender questioned him about the absence of his friend, he simply said “He’s busy right now. Ya know…pirate stuff. Just here to relax is all,” and that was that.

He’d been drinking slowly and calmly as he watched the world go by outside the window. Sitting at the barstools at the front of the house since a booth would only make him feel more empty.

He hadn’t spent the whole day there. He had nowhere else to go for what seemed like forever so at first he took a walk to let off some steam. Punched a tree or two when no one was around and finally settled here for the past few hours. Reading through old newspapers and patiently waiting for the moment he could go back home. He supposed he looked suspicious at this point, seeing as he could feel the bartender’s eyes on him more often then he liked. But he hoped it wouldn’t take too long now, the sun slowly starting to go down and darkness unfurling like a blanket in front of him.

Maybe I’ll stay at a motel. Go back and talk to him in the morning. I’ll take it all back and amount what he said to me to just be some funny little accident. We’ll laugh about something stupid like this eventually, we always have.

He had said the same thing to himself all day. That this was just another rare hiccup in their relationship. Nothing to worry about, nothing to cry over. They’ve always been together from the start, something as simple as this wouldn’t change anything.

If only we never met that girl. It would’ve never gotten that bad. He could have relaxed, I wouldn’t have had to worry. Everything was just too much at the wrong time and he was making it worse.

He took a sip out of his drink through the bendy straw, swirling it in his mouth for a moment before swallowing hard. His fists reflexively clenched through the anger.

Why did some random woman just bring out the worst in him? He’s never been like that before. If anyone bothers him like those Strawhats or Heart pirates he swipes it off eventually. Not wanting to waste his time on people that just get in the way. But it’s almost like he wanted her to be in his way and getting angry at her for being there to begin with. Maybe…he just wanted someone to let his frustrations out on rather than me or the crew? But he saved her from drowning, the one thing that could kill him easily. God and the way he looked at her last night on that cot, I can’t remember the last time he looked at a woman like that-

He cut himself off mid thought, realizing something rather strange finally piece together.

Kid isn’t a man of words, he’s a man of action, so why talk to the woman you want gone when you can just get rid of her? Which means he wanted her there. He didn’t want her to leave but once everyone else got involved he couldn’t be selfish anymore.

He didn’t want me getting in the way in the first place which is why he brushed me off.

…

Oh my god he’s in love with a lunatic.

As if some otherworldly power had been listening in on his thoughts he saw you walk by the window. Not super close thankfully but he spotted you across the other side of the street, walking rather fast with your hood up. The streetlights had come on but the sun was still barely peeking through, providing him just enough light to see you instantly.

Not again.

He wanted to immediately panic. Maybe his subconscious was starting to correlate you and the worst possible things happening to him. But as he watched you walk he made the rational decision not to freak out.

She lives here, this is her town. Of course she can walk around it, which is not unusual.

But what was unusual was the speed at which you were going, before he knew it you were out of view of the large window in front of him and he could’ve sworn your face looked very…serious. As if something had happened he wasn’t aware of.

Or something was about to happen. This road leads right to the docks. She’s walking fast. She looks serious. Fucking hell its nighttime and she’s injured she should be resting.

Killer nearly smacked himself on the head for that last bit. Am I seriously telling yet another injured person they should be resting? Am I going insane or is my secret calling to be a nurse because I swear to fucking god its not.

Without even really thinking about it he slung out some cash, slapped it on the table and instantly headed out the door. The bartender tried to give him a friendly goodbye from behind the bar but before she could even manage that, the door had swung shut.

He spotted you immediately down the long winding road. Picking up the pace and using his long legs to try and catch up to you.

This looks creepy doesn’t it. A big man following some girl. And oh lord she’s going to freak out when she spots me.

He had no other way to make this seem evenly slightly normal. He didn’t even know if you’d want to talk to him. But this felt important, or moreover he needed some context about a lot of things and you were the only one who’d provide that currently.

Right when he was about to shout to grab your attention you turned around and looked at him from afar, slowing down to a stop but not saying anything until he proceeded a bit closer.

“So this is how you murder people huh? Walk up to them causally like you wanna talk about fresh baked pies and not murder.” You spoke out, eyes narrowing on the man as you craned your neck to look at him from behind you.

Killer, who was not at all expecting you to be so calm about this did his best to walk forward with a sense of purpose. His voice even and calm as he spoke. “I’m not here to murder you. I just want to talk.”

“You don’t seem like that talking type.” You mumbled, your hand almost itching to grab out your gun but you paused, staying still despite the bit of alarm he caused you.

Maybe this is a good thing. A slightly freaky thing considering he's walking up to me but a good thing. I can get him to grab my stuff and avoid the ship all together.

“Well sometimes I like to make exceptions. Keep em guessing.” Killer stepped up closer to your side, causing you to finally turn your body a bit more towards him. He didn't seem torn with anger nor did his body look tense. Which of course just meant he was leading you into a false sense of security.

I really need to stop being so paranoid.

“Well aren’t you funny. Fine. I’ll talk to you but you gotta help me with something. Deal?” You tilted your head at him, keeping your hands shoved in your pockets.

“What is this something you speak of?”

You rose an eyebrow at that, finding the way he was talking to be far too controlled then usual.

Well I guess I barely know the guy but if he's really apart of that crew then he clearly doesn't have the lingo down.

“I left some…of my stuff on your ship and since your Captain physically threw me off I have to go retrieve it.” It was almost physically painful to mention the whole him catapulting you into the air thing. Lips turning into a hard line of uncomfortableness.

If Killer did notice your obvious distress over the situation, he sure as hell didn't let that on. “Sounds fair enough. Lets walk and talk then shall we?” Killer causally motioned his hand down the road. Politely ready to walk with you in step as if thats what he wanted to do all along.

Does he want me to go back there?

“What do you even want to talk about?” You mentioned back, turning with him in stride as the two of you started to walk together. You kept your pace a little slower then before, trying to discern his motives before you walked into what could be a trap.

I mean what could this guy even ask me thats so concerning? He clearly knows nothing about me because if he did I would have a lot more problems then just some nosy guy.

“You and Kid.”

What the-

“Me and Kid? I barely like to be mentioned in the same sentence as him. Why in the world would I talk to you about that?" You truly hadn't a single clue why he would care about that. Even thinking about him made your skin burn red with some sort of embarrassment hatred hybrid.

Unless he thinks something happened. I mean Kid was acting like a madman but thats just how is always is I'm assuming. Unless...I'm wrong?

"Just let me ask some questions, you want your stuff back don't you?" The way Killer said that instantly ticked you off. Hard-balling him beside you with a huff knowing that he damn well loved having some leverage over you.

Well at least this means I don't gotta pay anyone anything.

"Goddamn it, fine. If you couldn't already tell he provided me with the most embarrassingly horrific event of my life. So if you’re wondering if I still care about the whole town pillaging thing anymore then guess what, I don’t. He can try to burn the whole place down if he wants. A kind of guy like him couldn’t even make a dent in a tin can.” You spat out, looking ahead at the road.

“You don’t think he’s strong?” Killer replied as if you were stupid or blind, maybe even a mix of both.

Theres no way she can actually thing that. Matter of fact I know thats a lie.

“Of course I know he's strong, I may have been having a panic attack but I was still completely lucid asshole." You cocked your head to the side to look at him. But by Killers continued silence you could tell he wanted a bit more explanation then that, so you huffed out and continued.

"But he’s an idiot. He gets angry at absolutely nothing and it gets in the way of everything. He even yelled at his crew to stop and they didn’t even listen earlier. I’ve been around long enough to know that means something.” You talked with your hands motioning in the air. Clearly more intertwined in your thoughts about Kid then you realized. Which didn't come as a surprise but what Killer pegged as strange was why you of all people would care about Kid’s own crew listening to him.

Does she expect something better of him then? Some sort of pre-perceived idea of what leading should look like?

“Well the only reason they didn’t listen is because you were bad mouthing him. They really love him as their captain. Not listening to his orders just to save his reputation.” He thought that would clear the air a little bit, but by the way you rolled your eyes at him it only seemed like he had made it sound worse.

"If you always follow your emotions instead of orders, people are bound to get killed. You can't just push rationality aside because someone pissed you off." Your voice came out clear and unbothered as if those very words were written on your hand so you'd remember. Reciting old doctrine or some sort of moral code that Killer had no idea why you of all people would care so much about.

She...cares about rational decisions? This girl made the most ludicrous decision not even 24 hours ago.

"But when it comes to you being rational, all sense of life perseverance goes out the window."

Those simple words hit you over the head like a frying pan. Corners of your mouth digging into your jaw as you frowned at the man.

"Oh shut up, you know that was a mistake. I've done dangerous stuff all my life so its not like I begged and pleaded to fall in."

At least I'm assuming, I don't actually remember-

"I'm talking about making the wrong decision because you want to do something, selfish or not. If you know you can't handle it or that it'll turn out horribly if you try, then why even do it? Its stupid and it puts more people then just you at risk." You knew you were 100% percent right on this and nothing was going to change that. What confused you though was how Killer had seemingly never thought about it like that before, or at least from what you could tell since you could barely get a read on the guy.

"This coming from experience?" Killer simple said, as if peering into your very being beside you. You had expected retaliation or some form of agreement yet this was just another weird shot at knowing something obscure and irrelevant about you. And just like last time, this also made you glow red.

"No of course not! I just...I'm not stupid okay? You can think whatever you want about me really, I truly do not care but I know what I'm talking about. Kid seems like the kinda guy who thinks he can do anything but he's just going to end up getting hurt. God...I bet thats why he lost that arm of his. Doing something without thinking it through and just-"

"You sure you hate the guy? You seem far to concerned about what has happened to him." Killer had watched your tone change slightly as you rambled on about how wrong he was about this being a personal experience.

Yeah right-

And how you seemingly...cared about Kid? Is that what that was?

Which made you blink twice, realizing how you sounded before you composed yourself once again. "Of course I do. Having rightful judgments isn't me being all goggly eyed, I just pick up on things. Like how back on the deck you didn't do or say anything when things got out of hand. Which means you either don't care about Kid and will let him feel the pain of his mistakes or you don't like fighting over things you find meaningless."

Ahh beautiful sweet deflection. Her and Kid should write a book on it together.

"Both are wrong. I do care and I didn't think it was entirely meaningless, at least not to Kid or the crew." Killer surprisingly didn't call out her deflection, considering being honest might make her trust him more and clearly the girl was permanently too paranoid to do that easily.

"But clearly if you didn't step in to help, then you wanted Kid to deal with it. Which makes you lazy or like I said before, you wanted him to fix his own mess. Make him deal with it because maybe you're getting tired of dealing with him." You pointed your finger up at the man next to you like a nerd. A weird little sadistic smile on your lips as you finally managed a good jab at his inner psyche. Which he didn't take to well, but again she couldn't tell.

"Yeah. Sure." Saying so little definitely looked guilty, but saying much more would've been far worse. So he landed on sarcasm, which perfectly titled your defense into the unsure pile.

"What? Did I hit the nail on the head with that one? Or are you the only one allowed to pick people apart in this conversation hmmm?" You did that weird little evil smile up at him again. Leaning closer to him as you walked.

Kids right, she is a brat.

Killer sighed slightly, knowing damn well he did not want to fight you on this, he had bigger fish to fry. "Yep, you guessed correctly. You've been enough of a headache for me so its my turn to pick you apart. What did Kid say to you at the bar last night?"

"This whole deflecting this is getting kinda funny ya know." You rasped, visibly deflating next to him slightly and loosing that smugness you held earlier.

Is she getting paid to be this expressive or is being extra just natural? Hell, at least I can read her well.

"And you know whats going to be even funnier?" He said back, which caught you short puppy eyed expression of curiosity back in an instant. "The sad look on your face when I don't go grab your stuff for you. A real knee slapper really."

While Killer tried held back a laugh at the instant regret on your face, you smacked his arm. It threw him off a little when you touched him but he couldn't help himself but actually chuckle this time. You genuinely went from curious to pissed in a matter of milliseconds.

She's a pain but at least she fun to mess with.

"I swear to god I should've known you'd be just as annoying as he was. Why do you want to know about that anyways? It was barely a 5 minute conversation and he basically just bragged the whole time." You said with that same huff of annoyance out for the six millionth time.

“About what exactly?” Killer of course already knew half of the story, but he needed to see how you felt about everything if this was going to work.

”You seriously wanna know? Isn't there more important highly invasive questions you could be asking? Like how big my boobs are and when I cried last.” You motion your hands towards your boobs as if to mock him, which of course was both strange and yet again very funny.

He smiled behind his mask for a moment before cooking up and throwing back something equally humiliating. “Is that what you wanted to talk about all along? Because I can guess both of those pretty easily if you wanted to know. Or should I go get Kid for the tit size testing since he clearly knows his way around your body?"

If Killer had ever seen you red before, well that was just an eighth of what was happening right now.

"HUH?" It almost took you a second to even process what was just said and when it did it only got worse. Your hands flailing in the air as you spoke like you were swatting away impure thoughts.

"Why in the hell would he know anything about me?! Let alone something like that. Jesus christ, clearly you two have explored each others bodies but leave me the fuck out it."

If Killer wasn't good at this whole hiding emotions things he would've busted out laughing at that. Feeling a soft snort come out of his nose before he started up again.

"Me and Kid? Now why in the world would you be thinking about that? Unless...you wanna join in of course." His words were silky smooth and seductive, leaning closer to you now just like you did to him earlier.

At this point you were a damn stop sign or a swatch of paint kind of red. The whole Kid thing was already bad enough but now it was just too much. The top of your head to bottom of your feet shuddering.

"Okay! I get it! Your a male prostitute and a pirate! What an eclectic resume you must have but I did not pay for these services so either step back or Imma start screaming." You put up your hands defensively and started to veer away from the man as you too walked. Keeping an awkward amount of space between the two of you.

"Hey don't be like that." He said, trying to sound sad but if anything being called a male prostitute was a new one that tickled his funny bone in the right places.

"Or what? Personally I think yelling about the whole male prostitute thing so the rest of the street hears it is a better idea." You motioned your hands around the street, which was mostly empty but houses and stores still lined the sides of both of them.

"Word of mouth is a good advertisement technique." Killer nodded his head and place his hand on his chin to agree with himself. Which made your jaw nearly snap in half and fall to the floor.

"I'm really starting to think your serious." You mumbled out, slowing down to a stop finally since the docks were getting rather close at this point. Killer stopped along with you, still keeping the distance.

"You wanna know what I think?"

You opened your mouth to saying something but he immediately cut you off.

"Never mind. I don't really care if you want to know or not. Because something has been scratching at me this whole time and it has something to do with you and Kid."

"First off, I don't want to know what you think. Secondly, the whole me and Kid thing was so early this morning. Stay with the trends buddy 'cause I'm all about getting my stuff back, which includes not interacting with that idiot if I can manage."

Killer eyed you curiously looking for any holes in your words or body language. You seemed decent about bouncing back from things like this Killer had noticed. Your emotions strong but after a bit you could guide the handle. But right now he was hoping you slip up if even for just a moment.

"So you don't want to see him at all? Or maybe even ask me some questions about him? Maybe how he lost his arm or why he was so angry with you?" He wanted to peak your curiosity and he could tell part of you was giving in. The way your eyes widened slightly and that same puppy eyed look came back.

"No of course not. Even if I did why would I trust you to tell me anything? Either your a freaky little sadistic asshole like Kid or you have some sort of personal gain."

Well I guess shes right about one of those things, to bad she'll never guess why.

“Well you don’t know the whole story so I have my reasons.” He crossed his arms and left her hanging with that little statement. Just forcing her to finally ask him a question and give into that oh so potent curious nature.

“And what would the whole story be huh?" You narrowed your eyes at him. Matching his body language and folding your arms just the same.

“Hmmm probably the part about him saving you by himself. By the way, don’t tell him I told you that.” He said that as if it was the lightest most innocent thing to just causally mention. Which left you doubling over the second you got your bearings.

“Why would I ever tell him anything-wait what? He saved me? He’s the one who did it?” You eyes had nearly widened to saucers and even if Killer was a blind man he could've seen the obvious excitement on your face. Taking a step closer to him like a bait to a fish.

“Yep. Came back to the ship completely soaked with you on his shoulder. Which is rather strange considering how the sea can kill him and all." This matter of factly air was perfect for you, saying just enough to drag you in deeper. An image of you laid upon one of his shoulders making you unconsciously blush.

“I know how Devil fruits work dumbass I’m not stupid. But why in the hell would he do that then? And again I talked to him like twice before that and both times were horrible.” You snapped back, feigning disinterest. Right now on the inside you didn't know exactly how to feel, which was making your stomach turn and your knees wobbly.

Probably just the injuries. I'm feeling weak and most likely have an concussion this is to be suspected.

“Maybe to you they were but not to him. He complained to me about you.” Killer tapped his foot on the ground for a moment, watching over you as you crept closer.

“He most certainly complains about everyone so don’t try to fool me blondie” You rolled your eyes at that, scoffing at the man. Killer tell you were right on the edge, about to fall into his little plan. He just needed you to stop doubting him for just a second.

I need to go deeper. Make her feel special.

“Well yeah you’re right but this was different. He said you looked at him like you understood him.” Though he didn't really understand what Kid himself meant by that, its not like he was lying. Just restating the truth in a way that left her up to speculation.

And speculate you did.

Like I understood him? Was that like...two second moment so special to him he just had to go tell his friend?

“And so what if I do? A girl can’t have some empathy once in a while?” You lied to your feelings out loud, feeling more and more like something else was going on that maybe you'd been overlooking.

“Not when it comes to the guy you supposedly hate.” Killer didn't want to come out right and say it. He knew you'd just get pissed and brush it off. So put a lot of weight on the word supposedly as he spoke. Though he almost knew for a fact now that he was right.

Supposedly huh? Something thats generally assumed but...not always right. But how could I be wrong about something I'm so...assured of? Your eyes flickered to something far less confident then before, but like always you rebounded. Pushing back harder trying to press him for real answers.

“Is this how men work? You’re nice to them for more then two seconds and suddenly I must just be begging to suck your dick. Cause if thats what you think then please politely stop talking next to me." You paused for only a second eyes going wide and a small fake gasp coming out of you.

"Oh wait that was too nice you might get the wrong idea. I meant step off fuck face or I’ll snap your jaw in half.” You nearly growled out, upper lip twitching into a snarl.

Killer quirked a smile at that. “Wow you really are meant for him. That’s just the kind of thing Kid would like.”

You raised an eyebrow, that same unsureness now swirling around in you like a tide pool. It was weird hearing this from the guys own best friend. And though you would scold yourself later for letting him affect you like this and getting curious, right now you couldn't help yourself but ask yet again.

“What thing?”

And right then Killer knew he had you by the hook. Just reeling you in slow and methodically.

“You being mean. Or listening to him. Either one.”

“You telling me he’s some kind of masochist?”

Killer again, nearly snorted at that.

“Well duh. I mean why else did he keep you on his boat for so long? Especially since it took him about two seconds to actually get rid of you.”

Fucking hell...that kind of a good point. No no no no no this can't be happening.

You swallowed hard, eyes flickering all over the place as you worked it out in your head. Trying to find just one reason why that wouldn't make sense, yet you were coming up short.

“You’re saying he wanted me there, fighting with him?” Those words just slipping past your tongue sounded wrong.

“I think so.”

You went silent for a moment. Which was rare for you because you never had any troubles keeping up the flow of conversation. You'd always say some joke or brush whatever it was off. You had learned that at a young age. Completely disregard every insult or badly chosen word as if it meant nothing. But here you were, settling in it with silence. Which only made you panic more and nearly fumble all over yourself.

“Your just g-getting weird ideas. I don’t care how long you’ve known the guy but telling me that is 100% just a ploy to fuck with me. So if that’s what you wanted out of this conversation you should’ve taken a better approach.” You tried to sound confident. Pointing a finger at the man across from you as if to blame this all on him.

But he's not talking about his own feelings or reasons. He's talking about how the other more horrible to deal with of the pair feels.

“Well Kids been going through a lot lately, hasn’t made him the best person and I think you’re partially to blame for that.” Killer mumbled, cocking his head at you. Which snapped you out of it ever so slightly because what in the fuck did he mean by that?

“How are his actions my fault?!” You placed a hand on your chest and cocked your head right back. Though Killer really couldn't blame you because even he didn't fully agree with what he had said.

“Because he likes you. And if I know anything about Kid he gets real strange when he likes someone.”

Again with his stupid matter of factly voice. I swear I'm going to rip is beard hairs out and feed them to him.

"I still don’t believe anything you’re saying! So you can drop that act wise guy. You don't know shit about anything so you know what? Goodbye. I can do this by myself." You turn abruptly and started heading back towards the dock with a quickened pace. The sounds of Killers heels clicking along right behind you.

“I just think that it would be better for the both of us if we went a little bit harder on the guy.” He said, trying to hide the almost pleading tone in his voice.

Fucking hell Im loosing her.

“Huh? How in the world would being meaner help? I get it he’s a masochist but I’m not trying to make the little freak spurt in his pants.” You spat back at him, trying to keep you brain on target instead of wandering off into whatever nightmare this man was trying to convince you of.

“No I’m just saying that if you push him harder I know he wouldn’t do anything that would actually hurt you. And if you think I’m wrong you should try it. It’ll prove my point.”Killer stayed looking over at you as you walked, though you had completely stopped looking at him. Brows furrowed and grimace as strong as ever.

“I’m not going to poke the bear. It’s way too much effort dealing with him.”

“Don’t lie to me, I know you love dealing with him or at least people like him. Which is why you followed us to that bar in the first place. You like being in the line of danger.”

You finally looked at him again which let Killer know he hit a soft spot with that one.

I mean she's gotta know herself pretty well. Theres no way she can runaway from that one when its true.

“Ughhh...fine, think whatever you wanna think. You can try to psychoanalyze me all you want but you don’t even know me. And how does this even benefit you anyways? You’re basically begging me to pester the guy for no real reasons."

“Cause I think he’ll be better off with you.”

Rather than me being the one to pester him.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“We’ll, aren’t you just turning into the nosy one now huh?”

You rolled your eyes and scoffed at that. Keeping your eyes ahead as you two walked closer and closer to the ship. The sun fully set at the moon hung about half way up in the sky.

Was Killer doing this for partially selfish reasons? Maybe…wait no scratch that, its a solid yes.

This isn’t manipulation...if I’m right anyways. And he would never actually hurt her. No. Never. Which is clearly the worst case scenario. I guess other than her hurting him.

He looked over at you for a moment beside him. Eyes gliding up and down before landing back down on your grouchy yet slightly red looking face.

There’s no way that could ever happen. Not in a million years. And if she did genuinely want to hurt him it wouldn’t be THAT bad. I mean look at her, she’s a little chaotic and snappy. Maybe a tad bit obsessive…and incident prone.

Oh what the hell am I thinking this is like sending two flaming rockets to slam right into each other.

Something bad is bound to happen even if it means I get Kid back and relying on me. He’ll be so beat up from the fall damage of whatever this crazy person next to me is thinking, that he’ll fall right back into the pattern of complaining to me like always. But I know its worth it even if I am a manipulative asshole. I mean what other choice do I have! I was planning on just talking to the guy but now I know neither of us are being reasonable with the way I reacted earlier.

He looked at you for a second again, not particularly liking you but still feeing guilty nonetheless. He could tell by the way your eyebrows stayed permanently furrowed that what he said had gotten to you. Which just meant it was only a matter of time before you and Kid crossed paths again on this dot of an island.

She’s the one that pulled us apart with that fight. Maybe she can be the one to put us back together.

Lost in his thoughts he didn’t even entirely notice you had stopped walking suddenly. Finding the spot next to him where you were now vacant.

“Y/N?” He called, turning around to see you a couple feet back frozen in place. Eyes wide as you stared out in front of you. It was almost a little eerie, your lips parted and your eyes seemingly unblinking. “Hey you good?”

“Marines.”

“Huh?” He hadn’t heard you the first time. Your voice coming out in a whisper. Stepping closer to you he slowly trailed to where your eyes were locked onto. Turning around and looking out at the ocean. At first he didn’t see it, thinking you were crazy for a moment. But the tip of something broke through the fog that had settled across the ocean. The tip of a rather large navy ship heading straight for the docks.

Oh no.

I wrote this low key worried ya’ll would forget all the correlations from the previous chapters but whateva. That’s my fault anyways lol. I feel like its becoming a lot more apparent whatever the hell is going on, but there’s going to be so much more. Actually I’ll even give ya’ll a hint, ya know that sketchbook Y/N freaks out about? THAT THING IS SUPER FUCKING IMPORTANT. Yes her dumb little book is extremely relevant who would’ve guessed? (Me. I would’ve). I feel like I need to get you guys excited again for this fanfic so hopefully this chapter was juicy enough. Lots and lots of mysteries and all that. Kisses and hugs cause I’ve missed ya’ll. Hope you’re doing good!!!!!

(P.S. Y/N canonically has a blicky now you should be so scared)

#eustass kid #one piece #eustasscaptainkid #kid pirates #killer one piece #one piece x reader #x reader #eustass kid x reader #eustass kid x y/n #eustass kid x you #massacre soldier killer

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echantedtoon · 1 year ago

Text

Ocean Deep Ch14 Mers And Ladies

(Warnings: Mentioning of killing/blood/murder/wounds/drowning/bloodloss, Y/n does have a stab wound but it's NOT serious and doesn't really affect her too much. Mentioning of yn being stabbed with a knife.

NOW SOME IMPORTANT INFO FOR THIS CHAPTER!! I have three things to announce.

Firstly just a quick recap of mer Tengen's design-

Tengen would be a white butterfly koi fish mer and would look like the linked post below except less eel and more butterfly koi also below.

Merman Tengen( minus the eel like features)

his tail would be more like this instead

Secondly the QnA from last chapter. If any questions are lumped together then it's because the same person asked more than one question.

*Is Y/n still alive?

Obviously yes. And she's ok.

*Do mers have jobs or just chill in the ocean? Is there a mer equivalent to the demon slayer corps? Is there a reason why the wives chose to go by Tengen's last names and not Rengoku's? Why does Rengoku still go by his own last name? Is polygamy more common among mers?

They just chill. No not really. Usually only the lady mers change their last names but this isn't always the case, but they love Tengen very much. Rengoku is still attached to his family name. Not really. Some mers are poly some aren't.

*How many chapters are left?

Im not sure. I already have the plot in mind, it's just a matter of writing it out.

*Was Tengen's parts near the end a flashback or happening in the moment?

In the moment. No flashbacks that chapter.

Thanks to everyone who asked questions! Now that's over with-

Thirdly, I made a small side story for Ocean Deep containing Mer Douma x Reader. The link for anyone who wants to read it is below I also read you can replace a pint of blood after donating it within 24 hours if this is inaccurate I apologize.

taglist: @six-eyed-samurai @lavenderdrxp @jjamsbangtan @camilo-uwu @hopefulworld1

@shadyd3ar @amypop122 @azuredragonstrike

@mimisweetz @chaoticoperatorduckhairdo @staarflowerr @aleee-386

Remember if you want to be added to the tag list lemme know.

"Leave her on the beach! Someone will find her or she'll wake up and go home herself!"

A voice..Male. Deeper. Different. Unfamiliar.

"We can't just abandon her! She's wounded! LOOK FOR YOURSELF!"

Pain. Numbness. Cold black closing in.

"....."

"Tengen, please."

"....Press down on the wound tightly. It's a long trip and if she's going to make it then she'll need all the blood she can keep in her body."

Where are you?

.. Everything is so dark.

What happened?

Why isn't there anything here?

We're you dead? Did you finally die? Is this what being dead was? Nothing but black abyss where you couldn't feel anything? ...It was ..oddly peaceful despite being so eerie.

"-likeliness to survive is guaranteed I'd say."

Huh? What was that? It sounded like the second half of a sentence you only just now noticed. Was there other spirits here with you?

"That's a relief. I was worried about the stab to her shoulder there. I do hope she's not too hurt."

"Don't worry yourself too much, Koyuki. It was a rather small blade and it only stabbed some fat and muscle. A few stitches and some rest will have her healed up within a few months!"

A small sigh of relief. "Oh thank goodness. I'm sure everyone will be relieved to hear that."

"How about you? How are you feeling today? That sudden fever came out of nowhere."

"I feel much better but Shinobu says I should stay in bed today."

"That's good. Did she wake up while we were gone?"

"No but she did move in her sleep."

"Ah. Good. That means she might wake up soon. I'll just take your temperature and leave you two to rest for a little while."

There was the sounds of retreating footsteps and maybe a door squeaking shut. Did the afterlife even have doors? You didn't get a chance before the world fell into unconscious again- The next time you regained consciousness, you opened your eyes only to blink suddenly as a harsh light beamed down on you. Was that the fabled tunnel? We're you going to heaven?! A few blinks more had the harsh light evening out into other less harsh colors of browns and beige. You didn't know heaven had an oak ceiling-...

Wait. Ceiling?

F/c eyes blinked and eyebrows scrunched in confusion as your vision ever so slowly unblurred and you found yourself staring at an oakwood ceiling. There was silence as you continued to stare at it for the longest time.. before your head tilted to the right. The light source was discovered in the form of an open window. The sight of a calm blue sky and fluffy white clouds greeted you and a nice warm breeze bringing the smell of the salty ocean came through...Wait. This wasn't the beach. Could it be-??

Your eyes shifted down to your body and you only now felt the soft warmth hugging your body. Clean sheets covered your body as you lied upon your futon and a nice thick and warm blue blanket covered you from your feet to your neck. You were..in bed?? Could it be that this entire thing was just a dream? Only a silly dream about mermaids and jewelry and Akira that felt like it lasted for months but was really only a night or two?

Slowly you willed your arm to move. Your right arm pushed up, up, up. You felt heavy, sluggish, and every movement was a pins and needles tingling feeling. The blue blanket fell away partially as your hand extended to the ceiling and wriggled all five fingers. Your other hand went to do the same thing-

UNTIL A WHITE HOT PAIN SHOT FROM YOUR SHOULDER AND DOWN YOUR SPINE-!!!

"AH!!"

You couldn't help but cry out from the sudden throbbing pain that shot from your shoulder and throughout your body. It was a burning throbbing pain that pulsed out from just behind your left shoulder. Your teeth gritted as you hissed, body contorting in pain and then there was a sharp gasp-

...Wait. That wasn't from you.

Your head turned to the left in the direction of the sound and froze as two pairs of eyes met. A pair of pretty cherry blossom pink eyes and equally shaped pretty white flower shaped pupils stared down at your confused orbs. For a moment there was nothing but silence as your brain processed the other person in the room looking at you- Before she jumped as your body moved quickly.

Pink eyes blinked watching the other woman quickly flip onto her right side and struggle to push herself up onto numb arms and legs. "W-Wait! Don't do that! You'll hurt yourself!"

The other paid no mind to her warnings as she proceeded to crawl like a rapid animal desperate to get away from here. Falling onto her face after getting entangled in the sheets and letting out a yelp of pain. A rush of adrenaline shot up into your veins as you forced yourself back up and, although probably looking ridiculous, you crawled desperately for the door despite the emense pain in your shoulder and how tingly and weak your limbs were.

"Please stop! You're making it worse!"

Ignored. A desperate churning voice pounded at your skull. Run! Run! Run! Get out! Get away! It shouted that over and over, and like a scared injured rabbit you obeyed that. Legs unready for walking were forced up- only for you to fall back onto them with a thud.

"Shinobu! Kanae! Somebody help!"

More people?! SCREW THIS!! In some adrenaline fueled strength, somehow your foggy mind was able to get up onto your legs shaking uncontrollably like you were a bare in a blizzard! You ran! Throwing yourself at the door and throwing it open with a slide! A loud thudding sound reverberated throughout the hall and room as you threw yourself out- Only to collide almost collide into someone carrying a bowl. The pink haired girl squealed as you knocked into her, knocking the bowl of soup outta her hands. The distant sounds of spilling liquids filled the air behind you as your body collided with a wall so wobbly and unstable that you fell over onto your stomach. If your head wasn't blank from the pain, you might've heard the thud of the bowl and the clattering of a spoon somewhere behind you. Scrambling, clawing at the floorboards, and crawling like a desperate animal just turned free you carried on. Looking like a crazy person. Freedom! Freedom! To freedom you nearly were-

Until hands grabbed you.

You squealed out as two pairs of hands grabbed you by the arms on either side of your body and pulled you backwards and away from the door with a window in the middle showing the outside world and your near freedom.

"Fast one aren't you?"

"LET ME GO!," you shrieked kicking out weakly no avail.

Whoever it was was physically stronger as you were dragged across the floor back towards the room, and you were too physically weak to fight them off. Your shoulder still throbbed in pain but that didn't stop whoever they were from pulling you back into the room past the pink haired girl who tilted her head and looked worried with a hand to her face. You cursed pushing and pulling until you were plopped down onto something soft and you were finally released, falling backwards onto the soft bed- Your body said screw it and pushed yourself back up to snarl at your captors-...Only to be taken aback by what..Or better yet WHO who saw surrounding you.

LADIES!!

There was five other women in here staring at you. And all of them were fairly beautiful. There was the girl still sitting in the futon a few feet away from you, her long black hair flowing around her nightgown and an open book she had presumably been reading open wide on her lap. A second figure was worriedly shifting from one foot to the other looking the most worried and had long pink braids that faded to a lime green at the ends. But the two you REALLY noticed was the two looming over you. The one to the right was the most beautiful. Pretty pink eyes, tall, and long black hair that swayed when she tilted her smile at you. The second one was more around your height, and just as pretty with black hair with purple ends pinned up and lavender orbs gazing down at you. She also wore a smile but it looked more..blank than the first one. And then finally you caught a fifth person's gaze. Young. So young that she could've been your little sister if your parents had anyone children. She peeked around the doorframe curiously with pink eyes a similar shade to the tall girl but in design more to the purple eyed one. All three having a similar facial structure.

You stared at everyone around you bewildered before scowling. "Look- Just take what you want!" You held up a hand. "I don't have anything valuable on me anyways! Just let me go and I promise you I won't tell anyone!" The two smiling people exchanged looks above you. "I'm not worth the trouble anyways!"

There was a moment of silence still before Ms. Tall-With-Pink-Eyes chuckled holding a hand to her face. "I think she's mixing up the situation as something else."

"Well can you blame her with what she went through last night?," Ms. Lavender Eyes answered back before they both looked at you again. "I think we got off om the wrong foot." You jumped as with without warning she grabbed your eye forcing it more open as she peered at you. "Her eyes aren't clouded so that must mean she's completely lucid. Are you feeling light headed or anything similar?"

"Ow. " You pulled away from her shaking your head and scowling. "Just who are you people!? Where am I?!" Obviously you weren't home and you weren't on any beach. So where was this place?

"Forgive us. You must be very confused." Ms. Tall-With-Pink-Eyes spoke again before Ms. Lavender Eyes moved beside you. "I'm Kanae and that's my sister." She gestured to said sister who picked up your wrist to feel for a pulse as you were distracted. "You're here because you were hurt. Do you remember anything about what happened last night?"

"Last..night?"

She nodded as her sister went to your back. "Don't push yourself if you can't but can you tell us if you do remember what happened?"

Your eyes blinked. Mind going off in thought. What did happen last night? ..You remembered arriving at the beach- "I..remember the beach. It was so big and full of wreckage." Just thinking about all of those broken ships, some being where the men of your village spent their last living moments, sent chills down your spine. "And it was just turning sunset." You remembered how beautiful it was. You've never seen the sun make water sparkle like that. "Then I-" You opened your mouth but quickly stopped and closed it.

YOU COULDN'T TELL THEM YOU WERE HELPING MERMAIDS!! They might think you were crazy or having bad hallucinations! Or they might turn on you for helping nonhuman creatures!

"I was...releasing some fish back into the ocean I didn't want," you settled on. Technically it was the truth. Mermaids were part fish after all. "And then-"

You fell silent once more. A rock settling in your stomach. Akira. Knife. Stabbing. Everything going black!

"Akira!" The women jumped as you looked around wildly. Fear etched into your features. But there was no man amongst the women still amongst you. "Where is he?! H-He was on the docks with me when I passed out!"

"The man who stabbed you?" You flinched at Ms. Lavender Eye's blunt tone but she waved you off pulling the back of your collar to peek at your back. "..Hmm. The bandages are still clean and tied. I don't think she tore any stitches from her earlier stunt."

Your head craned behind you to raise a brow at her. "Stitches?"

She nodded. "You're extremely lucky! Your wound isn't very large or deep despite requiring stitches. You should be fully healed in two maybe three months. Obviously whoever tried to harm you was stupid in his selection of weapons!"

....You didn't know whether she was being serious or sarcastic with the bluntness of her words but you did frown. "Well thank goodness for that. I was worried about the size of knife that nearly killed me! Thank goodness for stupidity." Your eyes rolled. "But that still doesn't answer my questions. Who are you people and where am I?"

"Forgive us." Kanae(why does that name sound familiar?) smiled wider at you. Maybe to try to comfort you? "You're on an island a few miles off the coast you described. You were brought here by a few friends to have your wounds treated." She held up her hands. "But don't worry. As long as you take it easy, your wound shall heal in the timeframe my sister described." Well that's a relief. "However you lost some blood."

The blood drained from your face. "How..much?"

"About a pint I'd say. Don't worry. Usually the human body replaces that amount within twenty four hours but I want you to rest for at least two or three days before you try walking just in case."

"Oh...Will I be able to walk normally then?"

"Certainly."

You gave a sigh of relief. "Good. Then I can finally be able to go home." Kanae lost her smile for a moment giving a glance at her sister. "Then who are the rest of you?" You gave another look around the room. The other girl in bed was dressed a similar way to you in white nightgowns. We're you in a hospital? "Is she a patient too?"

"Oh. How rude of me. That's Koyuki. She's just running a fever. She's Shinobu, Mitsuri, and that is our younger sister in the doorway." Kanae pointed at each person as she told you their names with a smile. Mitsuri? Shinobu? Kanae? Koyuki? Why did all of their names sound familiar to you? You blinked as the blue blanket was pulled back up your body by Kanae. "Your body needs rest. Try to get comfortable and we'll bring you some food. You'll be needing lots of liquids and try to relax. Ok?"

You didn't know what to think really as you were made to lay back down and watched as they left. Where were you? Where was Akira? Where were your friends? We're they ok?....Your brain answered two of the four questions. Your friends are back in the ocean now safe and sound at last where they should be. By now they were probably already far away from here reuniting with Tengen(whoever he was) and they'd all be happy again.

...

A tiny smile formed on your face at the thought. It didn't matter if you were hurt. Your mission was successful and over with. Your friends were safe and home at last, you were no longer baring any burdens, and you were alive. Even if your current state was less than ideal, you didn't have to worry about anything else. Finally after so many months, the best kind of relief filled your body and you allowed yourself to relax. There was still the matter of Akira ..and Niko's horse but you'd happily deal with both of those later. With any luck the ships will be spared now and things could go back to the ways they were. Maybe people could even move back to town!

Oh how fate loved to throw boulders at you.

The Mitsuri girl had stayed to clean up the soup you made her spill (oops) and then two of the three sisters returned carrying trays of more soup. Kanae and her younger pinked eyed sister. The young girl couldn't have been older than fifteen or sixteen years tops. Both you and Koyuki had been given this crab soup and something dawned on you. The spoon lifted to your face but never touched your face as you froze up staring wide eyed. Footsteps softly thudded towards the doorway on their way ou-

"Kanae Kocho."

The footsteps stopped just shy of the doorway, back to the f/c eyes that now looked at her in familiarity.

"You're Kanae Kocho aren't you?! And your sisters are the same ones that disappeared last year!"

The realization had finally struck you. THESE REALLY ARE THE KOCHO SISTERS!! They'd disappeared last year and vanished without a trace! You weren't particularly close to the Kocho family but being in the same town you'd see them walking around from time to time. It just took you a while to recognize them!

"And you got kidnapped the year before that!," you accused pointing at Mitsuri who only blinked, "And you're the girl that was rumored to have drowned two years ago!" Koyuki blinked at the pointing hand. "What are you all doing here?! Don't you know your families are worried sick about you all?! What gives?! How did you escape that Naga?! Did you all just fake your deaths or something?!"

You couldn't help the rapid firing of questions that left your mouth under the mountain of realizations. These girls were apparently alive, not dead, and seemed in your point of view to be doing so well for themselves. What the hell gives?! No one answered. Giving you wide eyed silent stares until Kanae turned to you still with that smile which had now turned sad.

"Get some rest. Everything will be answered in time."

You were left just like that. Left with the weird sea food tasting soup to eat and with more questions than answers.

...

WHAT THE ACTUALLY HELL WAS GOING ON HERE?!

First all these girls disappear, then a couple merman destroy your town and way of life, then a merman shows up, then you get wrapped up in kidnapped mermaid drama, then you get stabbed while releasing said mermaids, and now the girls that are supposed to be dead... Aren't dead??? Just what the world did you get yourself into!? It was like just when you got yourself out of one mystery you fall into another! You tried talking to the other two remaining girls but Koyuki didn't say anything and Mitsuri squeaked out some excuse to leave quickly. It almost felt like you were back to square one... Y'know what? It's fine. If they ran away from home then that wasn't any of your business but you'd send some anonymous letters to the families (if you could find them) and let them sort this out. You didn't think they deserved to believe their daughters were dead.

You had enough things to worry about without getting involved into anymore drama.

Like getting back home and getting your life back in order. So you didn't mention anything about disappearing or mermaids for the rest of that day, and the next day either. Shinobu had shown up to look over yourself again and you only remained polite and short.

"Do you feel better today?", she asked you.

"Yes. Thank you ..And sorry about yesterday."

"Don't worry about it. I'd act the same way if I was you. Any pain or numbness?"

"Only in my shoulder."

That was it. Only a few sentences before she left again and you were left in bed to rest with nothing but more of that fish tasting soup to eat. You get that they wanted you to have more liquids but couldn't they at least give you better tasting soup?

You couldn't take it the third day. You awoke pretty early in the morning, in fact the sun was barely even up when you woke. Taking a moment you stared at the ceiling for a few minutes before glancing over to Koyuki. She was fast asleep softly snoring and turned away from you.. Everyone else was probably most likely still asleep this early as well.

NOW WAS YOUR CHANCE!

Slowly the blankets was peeled off your body and in the same manner as two days ago, you rolled onto your unhurt side to push up onto your hands and knees. Biting your tongue to not groan in pain that still lingered. Hurt or not you were leaving. You had done your duties, now you could just move on and never look back! Ever so slowly you pushed yourself to your feet which were still a bit wobbly but not as bad as it was two days ago. You should be able to walk now though if you went by what Kanae said. Tip toeing your way over, you slowly slid the door open only looking behind you once to make sure Koyuki was still fast asleep before popping your head into the hallway. It was quiet and no one else was around.

AND THE DOOR TO FREEDOM WAS STILL THERE DOWN THE HALL.

You slowly stepped out into the hall closing the door back behind you quietly. You still couldn't run with your wobbly legs so you instead wobble walked down the hall quietly and made for the door. You had a head start! If you hurried then you'd be able to get away without anyone noticing that you were missing. The front door was upon you. It slid open. You stepped out and quickly slid it back shut. You turned around-

AND THEN YOU WERE MET WITH THE OCEAN!

You stopped stunned by the long stretch of sandy beach only stopping when it collided with lazy waves rolling over the soft sand and wetting any shells under it. The silence was only broken by said waves and the soft footfalls of your feet taking a few steps in the squishy sand. The wind blew send stands of your messy hair flowing about and the hem of your long nightgown flowing. A few seagulls cried out in the distance excited to have some food and leaving you to stare.

"...Where am I?"

F/c orbs scanned the horizon where the sunrise was rising from the horizon. Nothing but blue water was in every direction you looked in. Not a sign of other land anywhere!...You were probably taking further down the beach! There wasn't any wreckage so that must mean you were taken further away from the docks. So if you just started walking then you'd soon come back to the graveyard of ships! Perfect! You hoped the horse was still windering where you left it. With a breath you began walking along the sandy shore and away from the house to get away before they could wake you up and drag you back to the room again.

So you walked. Wobbly along but you walked. And walked. And walked.

YOU DIDN'T SEE THE RED EYES WATCHING YOUR EVERY MOVE OR THE WHITE MASS UNDER THE WAVES FOLLOWING YOU.

Slowly the sun rose higher and higher in the sky making it warmer and brighter. Huh. You knew the coast was really big by the stories the fishermen told but you wondered how far up the beach they took you. Your right side was nothing but beach and ocean. Your left tropical forest you didn't want to go explore. The house was out of sight now, but you couldn't tell exactly how far away you were from it.

"I'm starting to get beat."

Your body still might've not have been fully recovered because you were quickly getting tired with the want to rest. You usually could go on for longer but you were in condition to fight your body's limits. So you stopped and looked around. There wasn't anywhere in sight that could be a suitable place to sit down and rest, until you spotted a large flat rock leading off the shore and into the water a little bit. The waves sloshing on the sides but not wetting the top. Seemed like a good of a place as any to sit down that wasn't in danger of sharp seashells or whatever dangerous animals might be in the unknown woods behind you. But it was smack dab in sight for all to see.

"..Ten minutes," you told yourself tiredly wobbling towards it, "It's only for just ten minutes. Then I'm leaving."

The squishy sand laced with sharp shells scraped under your tired legs soon replaced by warm but smooth rock as you stepped onto the flat stone and sighed. It felt nice. Magenta eyes watched the way you smiled beautifully at your feet and stepped further to the edge of the rock. Drifting closer the eyes came as she slowly lowered until she sat down submerging her legs to the knees and sighing in the relief the cool water gave her sore body. The bottom of her nightgown bunched up just above her kneecaps. A giggle escaping her as the waves rolled over her skin. She looked pretty.

You sighed in the relief your legs were currently getting hugged by the water. "This feels nice. It's too bad my shoulder is killing me."

Bubbles streaming to the surface got closer and closer to you as a white mass got closer and closer until a webbed hand silently reached out to grab the ledge of the rock behind you-

"Ah!" You hissed and gently reached a hand behind you to gentle rub your shoulder with a wince.

"Back pain? I hate that."

"Tell me about it. So annoying."

"I know right?"

"Yes."

"......"

A GLASS SHATTERING SOUND WENT OFF IN YOUR MIND.

Your eyes comically went wide as an owl's as you froze. ...And then you slowly turned around. A man with red wine eyes and white hair was staring at you from the Water's edge.

"Hey."

You squealed leaning back- S P LA S H!!

"SHIT!"

He cried out when her form disappeared under the waves and a second later he dove right back under after her. Silence claimed the area once more before you broke the surface of the Water gasping and clawing at the stone for dear life like a drowning cat desperately pulling yourself up with help from two large hands pushing you up by the waist. Scrambling and crawling onto the once nice dry rock spitting out nasty too salty water before coughing and hacking.

"'Eeehhh. Not really the flashy introduction I was hoping for."

You looked back up and yelped as a head was poking out of the water right in front of you. "Don't fall in again!" It- He shouted with an annoyed frown. "That's how you weak humans drown!"

"Wh-Who the hell are you?!" You leaned back leaning an arm up in case you had to defend yourself.

"You don't recognize me! I literally saved you like three days ago! Do humans really have that bad of a memory or what?!", he barked.

....Now you scowled. "Now see here you overgrown sea mule!" The man whoever he was blinked once taken aback by the sudden scowl and bite you gave him. "I'm too dam tired to be talked to like a brainless rock! I've been drained, stressed out my dam mind, attacked, and nearly drowned TWICE now! The last thing I need right now is the ocean equivalent of a donkey shit talking me! If you want to bother someone, go find a shark to antagonize!"

The man blinked once. Twice. Before he slowly hummed looking you up and down all drenched like a wet cat. "Well...The weren't wrong when they said you were certainly different."

"They? Just who are you?"

He hummed again crossing his arms over the rock's edge. "I thought you already knew...but then again you never met me personally and when we did you were already passed out." A giant smile of ABSOLUTELY LARGE FANGS made you give pause and gulp. "Allow me to actually give you a flashy introduction worthy of my status!"

Two clawed hands dug themselves into the rock and your jaw dropped in fear as an absolutely massive body hauled itself out of the water and onto the rock. A large shadow loomed over you.

He was-..massive!

Even larger than freaking KYOJURO!! And Kyo was bigger than Akira! A body beautiful sculpted by rippling muscles and scars sat itself upon the rock. Scattered purple scales glistening with water droplets aligned in a strange pattern you've never seen on any other mer across the torso and around the waist where his human half blended into a absolutely BEAUTIFUL shimmering white koi tail similar to Makio's only BIGGER and SHINIER! A rainbow pearlescent effect it had has the light bounced off his large koi tail. The fins large and flowing in the water like the fabric of beautiful silk in the wind. But that wasn't all.

A small jingling noise arose with him. The source being from the hoops dangling from his wrists. However you didn't notice that. Only the strange Mitch match of green and red sharp claws sticking out from hands large enough to crush you. Larger golden bands were tightly wrapped around his upper forearms as he flexed them out to you. But the thing was-

HE WAS ABSOLUTELY ADORNED IN JEWELS!!

A series of golden earrings were embedded into his ears, a similar piercing on his bottom lip. Across his forehead was some kind of large silver headband with three beautiful glimmering large diamonds in the front. Remember how Kyojuro's hands had a few rings? Well this guy had LOTS of rings! Some fingers having more than one on them. A long strand of shiny silver rocks clinked together and dangled from his headband. At least three different necklaces were wrapped around his neck with different valuable stones. Down his sculpted figure was a few various chains with a thick single silver one wrapped around his middle with a few polished seashells dangling from it's heavy bulk. But what really stood out was the large red and dark pink polished gems and stones pushed into his scales and embedded permanently into himself. The piercing wine red eyes crinkled up half lidded in a wide fanged smile at you- Holy shit! THOSE FANGS WERE LARGER THAN KYOJURO'S! His pure white hair falling down framing his face and for some reason a strange red birthmark over his right eye.

"I am Lord Tengen Uzui of the Western Isles! But you can call me Lord Tengen! And you have the honor of being in the presence of the God of Ocean's Deep!," he loudly announced out. Bold, assertive, and powerful enough to be feared by all who see him!

You only stared at him wide eyed. Holy shit...HE WAS BEAUTIFUL-!!

You immediately shook your head chasing away any of those thoughts. "...I don't believe it."

"Heh. Having a moment processing my flamboyant stature are you?"

"No. I can't believe the person responsible for half of my suffering is an over dressed full of himself watered down peacock."

"WHAT?!," he shouted turning towards your deadpanned face. "I'LL HAVE YOU KNOW THAT I'M THE MOST FLASHY AND STRONGEST MER THIS SIDE OF THE WEST COAST!!" He shouted in your face pointing a sharp red nail at your face, the bracelets around his wrists jingling with his movements.

".....I still don't see it. How'd you manage to beach all those ships? Flex and blind the captains with your over dressed scales?"

"HAVE SOME RESPECT FOR ME, GIRLIE!! I SAVED YOUR LIFE!!

"Right.." You glanced at the claw pointed at you, and then his large fangs as he gritted his teeth together annoyed. ..And just remembered how much bigger he was than you. On second thought it probably wasn't a good idea to argue with the guy that caused so much damage single handedly. You sighed with a breath. "Right. ..You did do that. Thanks for that." He huffed a sound. "No. I mean it. Thank you. And I'm sorry for being rude earlier. I'm just really on edge lately. A lot of bad stuff has happened recently."

"I've been told." He still looked and sounded annoyed but leaned back up from where he was sitting and recrossed his arms making his biceps and arms flex automatically. ".... You're going to live?"

It was a statement but the way he said it sounded like a question so you nodded. "Yes. I was told my shoulder isn't serious and it'll heal within a few months. I can live with that."

He hummed again. "I guess it's a good thing I got to you when I did then."

"Yes. Yes...So.. You're the famous Tengen Uzui I've heard so much about?" You took a moment to glance over this mountain of a man again. If he was human you estimated he'd he OVER six feet tall. "You're certainly a lot taller than I expected."

..That smile from before was back. "In the flashy flesh!" He winked and shot a one handed finger gun at you which in turn made you giggle. "And you must be Y/n. My wives' told me all about you."

"Ah. You mean Hinatsuru?"

"And Makio and Suma. And apparently Kyojuro.." His gaze peered off for a second. "He told me that you saved him after he stopped breathing. Is that true? Did he stop.. living?"

He was asking you about this now? You tilted his gaze to try to see his eyes but they were firmly set to where his tail met the water. "No. He never stopped living really." The eyes looked back to you. "He just needed a helping hand is all. So did everyone apparently...Are they alright now?"

He slowly nodded. "Yeah. Yeah they're fine." Both arms raised to hold the behind of his head. "They're all still asleep or just waking up by now. I know Suma is probably still sleeping in." He chuckled at nothing dryly. "It's so surreal to have them all back."

"I'm just glad they're alright. I can't imagine what you all went through was anything but terrifying."

"Tell me about it. You have no idea what it's like having every person you love tipped away from you with there being nothing you can do to prevent it. Never knowing what's happening to them or where they are." ... His eyes narrowed down at nothing. "Knowing if they were dead or alive."

"... You're right."

Tengen paused. Blinking. "What?" He looked at you arms falling to his sides. "What did you say?"

"I said-.. You're right." F/c eyes looked away guiltily from him. "You're right. I don't know what it's like to lose family, at least not in the way you did and Kyojuro did. ..My parents died when I was really young but there's a big difference between loosing someone to natural causes and loosing someone to someone's else's own selfish intentions. If my loved ones were kidnapped by someone and taken somewhere I could never get to-...I would have probably felt the same unbridled anger and fear you must've had." ...You looked up at him after he remained silent and found him staring at you with an absolutely shocked expression. "Um..Did I say something wrong?"

Tengen slowly shook his head no. "I-..N-No. it's not that. I-I-...Well to be perfectly honest with you I was actually waiting for you to start cursing me and tearing me apart with what happened to your life."

You blinked. "Oh. I guess they really did tell you everything about me huh?"

He nodded. "Yep. Completely everything. We're very honest with one another. I don't believe in keeping secrets from one another."

Oh gods. If they told him about the effects his actions had on your town and everyone's livelihoods- Then did that mean they literally told him about them kissing you?! And Kyojuro proposing?! And- Oh god. You hoped Kyojuro didn't tell him that-

"So.." A cheeky smirk crossed his face. Leaning closer to your reddening face. "Do all women have this magical power of medical kissing?~"

"UUUUUUGGGHHH!!" You shouted into the open air making him burst into loud laughter as you raised your hands and loudly facepalmed. "FOR THE LAST TIME! IT! WASN'T! A! KISS!! IT'S C! P! R! IT'S A MEDICAL TECHNIQUE EVERYONE IN MY TOWN WAS TAUGHT!"

"Ooh.~ A secret excuse for kissing your neighbors. How flashy.~"

Your madly blushing face snapped to him. "ONE MORE JOKE AND I'LL TURN YOU INTO FISH BAIT!!"

"HAHAHAHAHA!!" His loud laugh and large smile made the seemingly narcissistic personality and the scary persona before that seemed non existent. Melting to a joyful painting that had tears forming at the corners of his eyes. "I wouldn't expect anything less! You certainly exceeded my expectations of you."

"Well..Who did you expect me to be?" You changed the topic feeling your face burning up.

He shrugged still chuckling and shoulders shaking. "Well..I know I wasn't expecting an innocent angel, not with your attitude. But I also wasn't expecting you to literally agree with what I had done so easily."

"I don't agree with what you did." He blinked as you held up a hand. "Not fully. I said I understand why you did what you did and I can sympathize with everyone of you, but I can't forget the damage it caused everyone who wasn't responsible for what you all went through. I DON'T!!" You quickly held up a hand when he opened his mouth. "Blame you. I really don't. But I can say what you did didn't just affect me either."

.. Tengen slowly closed his mouth letting a sigh through his nose. "You-..Have that right, and I can't deny you're right. But you sound almost guilty."

You blinked surprised. "You can tell?"

"I have very good hearing. Sounds and tones tell me a lot. It's how I heard you leaving the house you were in." Ah. That explained the sudden appearance. "Is there a reason to that?"

"I-..*sigh* I dunno. I guess I feel guilty because I did kinda blame you for a lot of what happened for a while but-..I don't know." Your hand held your head again. "A lot of things have been complicated for a long time."

"I- Yeah. I know that feeling."

Silence followed. Nothing but the soft waves sloshing on the shore and a few seagulls cawing in the distance.

"...So why did you follow me?" You peered at him from the corner of your eyes. "You said you followed me from that house."

He shrugged. "Curious about ya I guess. And if I'm being a bit honest, I wanted to be sure they weren't being tricked by anyone. No offense."

"With what you went through it's understandable. I'd do that to if I was you."

"There was another reason why I followed you though. Well two reasons really."

Oh? You turned raising a brow. "Really? And what are those reasons?"

"Well Firstly I wanted to see if you were ok or not. I was told you were fine by those girls-" Wait. Tengen knew Kanae and the others? "-but I had to see for myself. The second reason was to thank you."

"Huh? Thank me? For what?"

"Everything. You willingly put yourself in danger for someone who wasn't even the same species. Do you know how many humans would literally do that willingly? Humans are selfish creatures who-" He paused as your brow rose higher. "Uh- *AHEM!* I mean the bad humans are selfish creatures."

"Nice save."

"I'm serious though. Every human I encountered would've never done something like that. So..Why did you get involved?"

You took a moment to pause. "..I don't really know. I guess it's because it was wrong? Maybe because I would've felt guilty if I didn't do anything? I don't know for sure but in the end it was the right choice wasn't it? I mean-" You gestured to him. "You're all back together and alright. That's what matters."

"Right, right. ...But what happened to you-"

"Wasn't your fault. Sure what you did had an effect on my life but none of this would've happened at all if those people didn't kidnap your wives. You were just trying to get them back. Maybe not the way I'd go about it but again I'm not you."

"Right. So is this the part where I apologize for everything or do humans do the whole emotional talking first?"

You snorted. A smile on your face before you turned to him again. "How about we both just forgive each other and call it even?"

He smiled wider. "Thank Posidon. I thought I'd have to spill every emotion I feel before we get here." You chuckled more. "Seriously however. I am grateful for what you did. Don't think I can repay you for that."

"Actually you can." His head tilted interested. "Don't sink anymore ships and we'll call it even. Alright?"

..Tengen smiled widely. "You got it. I don't think I have any more reason for that anyways."

Relief filled you. At least that was over with..You blinked at something the two of you hadn't noticed. Tengen blinked as you slowly got up and a hand gently grabbed the side of his face so gently. A second later a wet sleeve ran over the underside of his eyes.

"You're crying. Here. You'll be fine now..Sorry if it's not dry. Water will do that to you."

He didn't say anything. Only staring wide eyed at nothing until you backed away from him..and a hand slowly touched his cheek where your hand had previously been.

"Now then." You placed your hands on your hips and looked around. You've been walking for at least an hour now and there was still no sign of where you first started out from. "Can you tell me how far it is back to the docks?"

Tengen stared wide eyed at your form-

"Tengen."

"Huh? W-What?"

"I asked how much farther do I have to walk before I reach the docks again. I've been walking for at least an hour now."

He blinked again before looking confused. "Docks? You're not on the west coast anymore."

You stared at him. "...Beg pardon?"

"You're in my territory. This island here." A hand patted the rock you both stood on. "This is mine. So are the other two islands off the coast and the coast I claimed during my skirmish there."

You stared at him wide eyed. "Wait..Are you saying that Im actually stuck on a deserted island?"

"It's not deserted! Everyone's mates live up in the house there. That's why you were brought here. It has everything you need to stay."

You continued to stare at him. "...WHAT?!"

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lanaactuallyabanana · 6 days ago

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gen loss quickie lil theory/explanation!! (with a lot of paratheses)

@ranboolivesaysstuff @lexcat-11

ignore any misspelled words its currently 12 am as im finishing this so yeah!

little bit of context (lets set the scene here shall we?): i was watching ranboo's reaction to the lovely theory video essay on the founders game for gen loss made by the incredible lex cat (please check them out, they are super cool and have made some great videos and analyze gen loss so well, i want to be like lex cat when i grow up) after watching the full video itself without the reaction (as i am writing this i have actually not finished the whole reaction vid lmao) and i noticed a quick lil something..

this is a screenshot during the video that @lexcat-11 made when i realized something matched up..

the picture in the larger frame with the large ferris wheel and other carnival random thingies is one of the places during ben's journey from the founder game (not sure what chapter, someone let me know) with the whole interaction with the fortune teller blahblahblah

the picture in the smaller frame where my cursor was on the timestamp 11:48 is earlier in the video and in the game itself where ben walks by the theatre (as you can see in the text on the larger frame, and yes i spell theatre weird don't make my pillow warm for it D:) in his school (OR IS IT HIS SCHOOL??? *dun dun dunnnn this is your message and my wink wink hint hint to watch the video gasp*) while exploring after waking up

and obviously, if you compare these they are very similar! obviously they're both a typical festival/carnival which to me personally is a nostalgic kind of vibe (not sure if thats what ranboo and the gen loss team was going for but it kinda helps the story ig? lol) as an overall element, and have the same or atleast extremely similar individual details/elements, such as the ferris wheel and carnival tents and more

another detail to me tho is that they aren't just a copied and pasted image, i like how its not the same because it leaves some more detail to the story and overall thought to the morals of the story with a message of perspective, as theres a difference between the pictures, as one is from bens perspective as an unaware outsider to the set and then to his perspective as someone who is in that moment, is kinda sorta aware (depending on how you think about it and what "aware" means to you for the actors in gen loss) and is having a current personal moment/experience!

but basically to recap and explain for those who want it (if you're new to gen loss, a casual watcher and not a maniac like i am, etc), this whole thing ties in with how the founder and the production of showfall media's "sets" are essentially just random things in real life disorted to the actors and to the audience. this has been done to mainly hide truth/embrace lies, or to add meaning to something (whether that be fictional or the gen loss team trying to scramble us up lmaoaoaoaoao). this is very explicitly shown in certain parts of gen 1 where there were breaks and resets to ranboo's memory and character during random parts of the show bringing him in and out of his consience, or during the founders game at the end before we talk to the founder when we saw random objects being labeled things that they 100% are NOT (i giggled when it was just m i r r o r 🧍HAHHHAHAHAH)

so essentially this little set we saw was not just a school play (if it was a school play then WOW to the props crew, holy rich school) but perhaps a break in showfall media shown to us directly!

_______________________________________________

lex cat did mention this very briefly during this clip, i just wanted to give some of my thoughts and "explanation" though i know i didnt explain well lol, im just super excited about this :D

again go check out @lexcat-11, the founders game and all of generation loss, very cool stuff folks

LANA OUT!

#lana rants #lana rants about gen loss #ranboo #ranboolive #writing thoughts #gen loss #generation loss rant #generation loss #gen loss theory #gen loss ranboo #theory #rant #lana is back!!

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thewiz9062 · 1 year ago

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Smiling Critters: Together, We Resonate (No.6) - Catnap

NOTE: THIS IS NOT RELATED TO CANON IN THE SLIGHTEST. An accurate description of this au is that I took every playtime.co poster art and promotional material from the game and lit up the rest of canon in a bonfire. This means that EVERY character is part of one big cartoon. That's it. No bigger bodies project, no child souls, no experiments, just a depiction of a cartoon. PLEASE do not ask me to do anything suggestive with anyone.

Let's start:

Catnap had a fairly normal childhood up until four, where his parents died in front of him (cause of death is still pending)

After that, he was put in the system, and he quickly learned that it wasn't exactly the safest place, so he ran.

He ended up wandering for a while, sleeping in alleyway to alleyway until he found a random abandoned house (shack? Its one room and fairly small) in a secluded part of a neighborhood, and set up 'home' there. But is it really home without them?

Anyways, he made himself as comfortable as possible in his living conditions. If the residents heard crying near that secluded part of the neighborhood, they didn't say......well, except for Boxy Boo.

Boxy was the only one who dared to go check out the slight commotion and was attacked on sight. Well, pounced on, as boxy is about 3 times bigger than catnap at the moment. Even once he got him to calm down, he still didn't say a word to him, just glared at him until he left. What if it was my fault? What if i was the reason theyleftwhatifpeoplediebecauseofmeleavedontcomeclose But boxy made a vow to check on him at least once a week.

(Time skip- present day? Technically)

Bobby bearhug and picky piggy were picking apples in the forest next to the former neighborhood when they started hearing noises. Picky demanded that whoever was "messing" with them show themselves. And out came catnap. Picky dug into him about being creepy, but bobby was more worried about the state he was in. He looked way skinnier than he should be, assuming that he was their age (he is dw) so before picky sent him off Bobby offered some of the cookies she made. He was a little distrustful at first, but practically lit up for a second before quickly changing back to his blank face. But she noticed, and told him she could meet him back here tomorrow with some other food she wants him to try. He waved his hands and shook his head in a 'no' motion, but they were already off before they could register his response.

For the next few days, bobby brought him food to try, and he gave his best input for someone who doesn't talk. But she never really got to know anything about him, because any questions would be met with a blank stare. She pondered...maybe she should bring Dogday next time? He's great at making friends!

Guys look I traumatized him :D

This is supposed to be the whump but I feel like I overhyped it ngl

Additional notes:

-Insomniac (duh. I tried to give him eyebags in the little drawing I made but idk if they actually look like that)

-Situationally mute

-the whole red gas thing doesn't exist. I know it appeared in the little cartoon introducing chapter 3 but it feels extremely out of place here sooo

-instead, he hums or sings a little lullaby or melody to try and help him (others eventually ;) sleep. It usually has an opposite effect for him though, as the only ones he knows are his mothers, which reminds him of.....yeah.

-he really likes music because of this, even if he doesnt get to listen to it often. its sorta the one thing that he sorta still hangs on to.

I really enjoyed this one!! Next is gonna be our resident friend making machine, with a built-in recap to go with. Anyways BYEEE

#poppy playtime #smiling critters poppy playtime #smiling critters #smiling critters au #Together we Resonate AU #twr! catnap #catnap #art

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drgngutz · 11 months ago

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9 - Coast - Luffy x f!soulmate!reader

Chapter 9

Taglist: @mystic60 , @louisechec , @pinksh1t , @violetmatcha , @urbisexualfriend

Masterlist!

Content below the cut <3

It's been quite a couple of days since that night. So, let’s have a little recap:

First, the crew had managed to run into marines, my first encounter with them so far, and it was terrifying. They shot cannons at us even as we managed to lose them in a fog, the crew relatively at ease while it happened; I didn't understand how they could be so calm. If even one of those cannon balls hit the ship, we would've been sunk to the bottom of the ocean, and yet they were all just laying there... Luffy specifically 'couldn't move because he was too hungry,' and by that point I was ready to have a panic attack.

In the end, all thanks to Nami's navigational skills, we ended up arriving at an island inhabited by an army of goats that were led by an old man named Zenny. Throughout the four to five days we had stayed there, we had learned that he had used to be a pirate-money-lender, marooned after being chased off with a great fortune. Then, the same marines had somehow managed to track us down, and we found out the sergeant chasing us was actually acting against his higher-ups' orders; he wanted to search out Zenny and steal this alleged fortune, but it was actually eaten by goats, so there wasn’t any fortune to steal.

It was an insane venture, ending happily with the sergeant being arrested for his crimes, and the rest of the marine ships being destroyed in the reef surrounding the island when they made the move to arrest the crew. Zenny decidedly became a pirate himself, and all of the Strawhat crew remained relatively unharmed throughout the ordeal.

Oh, and during our stay, Zenny taught me how to take inventory, as well as how to easily manage finances. It was a skill that I was genuinely excited to try out with the crew, and was hoping it would be something that I could actually be useful for, since I felt like I had nothing valuable to contribute to the group. So, that was pretty exciting.

There was one recent development that was a bit of a downside, though...

"You don't look much like a pirate, girl." His voice grated from my side, old and weathered over the long years of use. I turned to look at him, confused on how he could tell. Why did it seem like everyone was able to see it so clearly? Was I that out of place?

"Um... Well, I'm not really. Luffy is my soulmate." I decided to leave out the part that I was from another world entirely.

"Soulmate?" He blinked widely at me, as if I had just told him the most surprising information in all his life.

"Yeah." I nodded, and he furrowed his brow.

"Sad for you, girl. He doesn't seem like he cares much for your company," he gestured to the teen, who was stuffing his mouth full of fruit a few feet away, completely oblivious to our conversation about him. My stomach dropped.

"That's... not true." I weakly denied. Truth be told, Luffy had gone back to his old ways of running around and doing whatever he pleased without so much as looking in my general direction. Every time he ate, did chores, or even before he slept; it was like I had been forgotten about all over again, I was a lost thought in the back of his mind. I had been trying my best, ignoring the discomfort to keep the peace, but if Zenny had noticed then...

"Well, I'm sure you thought it through. You've got some guts to follow a ruffian like him."

Guts. Maybe that's what I needed. Was I not 'gutsy' enough for him? Was he ignoring me because I wasn't his type? That wasn’t possible, right?

Well, fine. Whatever.

I could ignore him too.

And so, I had been... Sorta'.

It was a lot harder than I initially thought; Even as we were chased by marines again two days later, helping Henzo find his long lost friends in Ape's Concert (The Rainbow Mist), and saved the town from a tyrannical governor who was actually the ex-captain who ransacked the town years ago.

I couldn't help but feel guilty every time he said something and I would ignore him, or avoid his general presence whenever he waltzed on deck.

What I wanted was for him to see that he was bothering me, that his aloof nature wasn’t cutting it, but it was so conflicting to feel the bond of our souls say otherwise.

In an effort to hide my ever growing discomfort as each day crawled by, I had begun to work on a project with Robin. It was more for Robin's interest than my own, considering I had already accepted my transition into this world as final; But, after seeing inside of Ape's concert and its many mysterious abilities of warping time and space, Robin decided she would to attempt to formulate a hypothesis on my random appearance from the sky. Assuming that Ape's Concert was some sort of space-time rift, it would be a borderline perfect explanation for how I had managed to make it here practically out of thin air. We added it to the top of the list of possibilities, and I tried my best to help her brainstorm ways in which this might have taken place, despite my very limited knowledge. What she found most helpful from me seemed to be information about my old home, even though I had never once spotted a rainbow mist in my life; other than actual rainbows.

When the research was done, and I was stricken with boredom, I had to practically beg Nami to let me help with the finances of the ship. It took me several days, and lots of pining, in order for her to finally agree. She may or may not have practically ripped my head off in the process, but in my eyes, it was an absolute win.

Now I was able to help her keep track of the berries, the stock of the ship, and even the logs of our recent adventures. We came up with some different ways to distribute the money to the crewmates for the appropriate errands and even allocate them some personal spending money, much to Nami's dislike, and I was feeling fairly fulfilled.

Well, that was until I went back out on deck and was reminded of how stagnant my relationship had become with my soulmate, again. Fulfillment was replaced with frustration, and the loop reset once more (just like the never-ending waters of Ape's concert, funnily enough).

The exhaustion of course wasn't helping; nightmares seemed more and more frequent, morphing between my old memories of a shitty childhood and current issues regarding my soulmate, and sleep was becoming less and less. I felt awful about it, but there were a few times I had snapped at Nami or Usopp whenever they accidentally (or purposefully) pressed the wrong buttons. At those times, all I could do was apologize before keeping my lips shut tight. The others were picking up on my tenderness, I could tell, but I didn't feel like dragging them further into the drama anymore than they already were. Luffy couldn't tell at all, naturally.

And that's where we're at right now, to end that rather large summary. We've since left Henzo and friends' company, and are back to sailing on the open seas. Everyone is chatting about the recent adventure, Luffy expressing how fun it was, while the rest of them question how he could possibly have enjoyed something so dangerous and appalling. Zoro is working out somewhere in the background as everyone begins to disperse.

I feel a light tap on my shoulder, something small bounces off and drops to the floor, crumbling to bits on the floorboards. Confused, I furrow my brow and hold out a hand. Another piece of deteriorating-something falls there, practically turning to ash in my hand. I look upwards, seeing something overshadow the Going Merry, and feel my face pale.

"Is that rain?" Zoro asks, and I can’t find it in myself to respond.

"No way, this ain't rain." Sanji disagrees.

"U-Um..." I whimper out, seeing the massive galleon begin to fall upon us, "It's definitely not rain."

The rest of the crew look at me, then they look up.

Silence.

Chaos ensues. The boat lands only a few hundred feet from us, but the broken pieces of it are still falling onto the ship. The waves rock the boat side to side, nearly capsizing us from the force of the collision with the water.

"Why are things falling out of the sky so much recently?!" Usopp points an accusatory finger at me, scrambling desperately at the boards beneath him while sliding around.

"How am I supposed to know?!" I shout back at him, clinging to Nami and the mast as I struggle to keep myself in the same spot.

"And I'm not a thing, Usopp! I'm a person!"

"Why the hell does that matter?!"

Another wave comes, and Usopp is sent flying into me. The argument is soon forgotten as we clutch each other with a conjoined mission of trying not to fall off the boat. We slam into other crewmates, like Chopper, as we go.

More jostling, more shouting, and more panicking. Nami is screaming to turn the rudder, Zoro is saying it won't work. Sanji is shouting for Luffy to protect the ship, and Chopper is laying flat on the ground. Robin has managed to plant herself to the boat using her devil fruit.

Usopp lets go and I'm sent sprawling on my back, sputtering and coughing as bits of debris fall on my face. Something large, but light, falls on top of me as I attempt to recover, and as I clutch it in retaliation I can feel it fall apart in my hands.

I open my eyes, see the empty eye sockets of a skeleton in front of my face, and feel my stomach drop. It hits me that a literal dead person is laying on top of me, before I begin to screech so loud that I was sure every pirate and marine could hear me within fifty miles. The emittance hurt my throat, but I didn’t care.

All of them look at me, but I'm too busy flailing and getting further tangled with the dead guy, trying to get him off and failing; still screaming.

"A skeleton dead guy!" Usopp hollers with me.

"Don't just stand there, get that disgusting thing off her!" Nami shouts at Usopp in anger, who stays frozen.

"I'm surrounded by death..." He sobs hopelessly, before Zoro rushes over and finally rips the corpse off of me. Picking me up like a sack of potatoes, he rushes over to a safe spot where we both can hang on. I whimper out a 'thank you,' still shivering at the feeling of somebody's bones in my hands, and he grunts.

When the continuous rain of broken-ship finally stops berating us, Nami has come over to hold me since I couldn't stop shaking and Zoro didn't know what to do about it; while he, Sanji and Luffy begin to question what the hell just happened. Usopp and Chopper are quivering and holding each other tightly. Robin is looking at the skeleton with interest. I wanted to puke.

"Alright, why did a ship just fall out of the sky?" Luffy asked, sounding a little flabbergasted.

"Captain error?" Sanji asked.

"Well, the sky is clear. Who knows?" Zoro added.

"I knew coming to the grand line was a mistake. It freaks me out! First, we travel over a ship graveyard, and now they're falling out of the sky complete with skeletons!" Usopp cried, eyes bloodshot and looking around wildly. Chopper's teeth were clenched so tight he couldn't even speak.

"Uh, Nami, can you make sure there's no more ships about to fall on us?" Luffy asks, completely ignoring me.

"No, you idiot! I'm busy doing what you should be doing right now!" She yells at him.

"How would I even know that anyways?!"

"Doing what now?" He asks, fuddled by her first statement and disregarding her own question.

"Comforting your soulmate!" She barks at him, and I pull away anxiously as her hold tightens.

"I-It's fine." I mutter, not bothering to look at anyone as I turn toward the bathroom.

"I-I need to go wash my hands, anyways... They're covered in bone... dust..." I shiver, before moving toward the door. I couldn't care less about Luffy, right now; not when I was imagining my own bones turning to dust like that mans' was.

---

"A sky island, really?" I ask Nami, who nods.

I had finally come out of the bathroom after needing to recuperate from the scare. Also, it took a while to get the bone out from under my nails. Ugh.

"Yep, look," She pointed at the log pose, which was indeed angled skyward.

"And Luffy found a map of the island on that ship as it was sinking." She handed me the old, weathered parchment, and I unfurled it carefully.

Skypeia. It was written in Script at the top of the map, the other, much smaller writing being illegible from usage and time. You could still make out the shape of the island, though, surrounded by sea monsters and covered in forests. There were outlines of cities and people within it. I curled it up again and handed it back to Nami, afraid of leaving such a relic out in the elements for too long.

"So... How do we get there?" I asked, and she shrugged.

"Dunno'. But right now we're salvaging the ship to look for more clues. Luffy, Sanji and Zoro are down there now." Her tone sounded impassive.

Pause.

Luffy was at the bottom of the ocean?

I looked at the yellow tubing trailing down into the dark water, and felt my stomach turn. But, he couldn't swim, right? So how was he...?

"Um... is he gonna' be okay in there?" I voiced my concern, the current focus on ignoring him forgotten as the soulmate bond resurfaced my worry over his well-being.

"He'll be fine," Usopp brushes off my nervous look with a wave of his hand, "I made those barrels with a special design; they'll never get busted open!"

He seemed confident, but I still wasn't. Who would save him down there if something bad happened? I guess he did have the other two, but still, how would they swim up from the bottom of the ocean? That sounded impossible.

"If... If you say so." I said, though inside I disagreed with the words; but what could I do at this point? He was already down there.

I looked back over the ship's edge, realizing I had forgotten about something else when I came out. I meant to ask about it originally, but I was caught up in the weird contraption that was newly discovered to be keeping my soulmate alive. This ignoring thing wasn’t going so well.

"By the way, who's that?" I pointed at the large galleon next to our own small ship, looking like there were many, many men on its bow.

"Oh, yeah. That's another crew trying to salvage the same ship that the boys are on right now; speaking of which, I'm gonna' kill those morons if their captain doesn't do it for us."

"Nami," I took a moment, contemplating what she meant, "their captain is also on the ship?"

"Duh. What else did you think I meant?" She responded in her usual know-it-all tone.

"Woah. Okay, guys. What the hell did I miss?" I ask, completely overwhelmed by all the information she was feeding me.

"Quite a bit." Robin laughed from behind us.

"Well, to start--" Usopp started an explanation, before he lost his footing due to a sudden, large vibration.

RUMBLE.

Tremors began to erupt from the depths below, and a large, dark shadow began to spread below the boats. It stretched so long that I couldn’t see where it ended. I took a step away from the edge, heart racing at the sight; it was getting closer.

"There's something else down there..." Nami says nervously.

"It's huge. Anybody just wanna' run?" Usopp adds, sounding timid.

It bursts from the water beside the galleon right after he speaks. Water slides off its enormous, gray back as the waves disturb the ships gently. It looks like a turtle, or a tortoise, but of a gigantic size. Its eye stares forward, skin covered in warts and bumps as the tubes that are connected to our ship dangle from its sharp-toothed maw.

"Does anybody else see the monster the size of an island in front of us?!" Nami exclaims, sounding frustrated at the lack of response from the rest of the crew as we all stare up quietly, almost awe-stricken. I hear Chopper swallow thickly, looking ready to pass out.

Still, nobody responds. We continue to gaze at the creature, and the men on the galleon are panicking over their captain being eaten. Inwardly, I feel the same way, but it hasn’t registered just yet.

"One tooth is the size of our boat... That's it, we're dead!" Nami continues, before Usopp is crying out next.

"There's no big monster, this is just one big, stupid dream that we're all having together for some reason!" He's tear stricken, before Chopper is joining in.

"A dream, right!" He confirms, and they all sigh in relief, seemingly appeased by the thought. I'm not, however; still staring at the yellow tubes that hang from the things' mouth.

"I-It's definitely not a dream." I say quietly, stepping toward Robin like she would be my new source of comfort or while the others lose their minds.

"Our boys just got eaten." She states, matter of fact, and the trio freeze. The confirmation of my own worries makes me want to step away from her instead.

"...along with that ship we were trying to salvage." She states without a single hint of emotion in her voice.

"How can you be so calm?!" Usopp is hysterical about the situation, not that I could blame him, but Robin was always like that.

The creature begins to grind the boat in its teeth, chewing loudly in a way that everyone can hear the wood of the ship in its mouth crunching. It's like it could hear what we were saying, taunting that it had just eaten members of the crew, and my soulmate, too.

Chopper begins running back and forth, freaking out in his normal-form. Usopp begins blaming Nami, and I am desperately searching for the bond between my soulmate and I to tell me if he's dead or not. Nothing felt different, but I couldn’t find him, either.

If he was alive, I wouldn’t ignore him ever again. The regret was like acid in my stomach, eating away at my insides.

Then, the monster is moving. It meanders forward, and Robin makes a point that if we stay connected, it will likely drag us to the bottom of the ocean, evident enough by the fact that it's pulling both the ship and the galleon as it goes. She's trying to devise a plan as everyone's agitation increases.

"Usopp!" Nami shouts.

"Yeah!" He shouts back, looking motivated.

"Cut the air hoses and get us out of here!" She lifts a determined fist, and I finally snap out of my stupor.

"Are you a devil?!" Usopp accuses.

"She's a devil!" Chopper affirms.

"W-Wait, no– Don't do that!" I yelped.

"You can't, what if he's still alive down there?!"

"Why the hell are you so worried about Luffy?! He doesn't even pay attention to you, anyways!" She shouts back, seeming desperate.

Okay, ouch. Valid, but ouch.

My feelings are only hurt for a second before another tug on the ship doesn't let me dwell on it for long. There wasn't any time to worry about that now, we needed to find a solution; we needed to rescue Luffy and the others.

Then, the cherry on top, the sky suddenly goes overcast. It takes only a moment, as if a bunch of rain clouds just swooped in and placed themselves above us. That isn't the case, either; the entire ocean has been plunged into darkness. Nami mutters how that's impossible, Chopper and Usopp stutter in fright.

A burst of water from the side of the ship, and a gurgling Luffy is sent flying up into the air and on deck. He groans when he makes contact, hat falling off in the process. A massive sack is attached to his back. It looks heavy.

I can't believe he's still alive, relief flowing through my veins like a hard to quit drug. Through the fog of all the hair-raising events that have taken place so far, he’s the light house that reminds me why I’m here.

"Luffy!" I rush over, crashing to my knees as he still doesn't respond to any of his friends' cries of his name. Screw ignoring him, this was more important.

"H-Hey," I shake him desperately, dread filling my heart as it drops at the pale shade of his face. He doesn’t respond.

"Get up, Luffy! Please don't be dead– wake up!"

The begging seems to work. His eyebrows twitch, before his eyes snap open and his skin begins to turn back to its usual tan. When we lock eyes, he grins, still laying flat on the deck.

"Oh, hey!" He blinks, "What's up?"

"A-Are you okay?" I scan all over his face, before giving a quick glance over the rest of his body. Nothing seems out of the ordinary, and I can feel the nerves inch away.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" He laughs, completely unphased, and I breathe a sigh of relief. He sits up, cocking his head to the side as he waits for my answer.

"Well... you were eaten by a giant turtle." I put it simply, not knowing how else to say it.

"Wait, really?!" He looks at me with wide eyes after snatching his strawhat from the floor, hand covering it in disbelief.

"Um, yeah--" Before I can finish, his eyes zip to something behind and above us. I can hear the angered-screaming steadily grow closer before Luffy's eyes get serious. It's quick; he loops an arm around my waist and tugs me with him as he rolls out of the way of the incoming punch, which leaves a dent in the wood where we were just sitting. His arm leaves the space once the deed was done, goosebumps raising all over as he pulls away. My heart stutters, feeling giddy at the fact that he had basically saved me, before it was covered by confusion.

The monkey man, who I assumed was the captain of the other ship, beats his chest and yells something at Luffy.

"He's... a monkey?" I ask, bewildered.

"Yep," Luffy laughs, "Sure is. A monkey wearing makeup!"

"That's... weird."

"I know. He said it makes him look refined or somethin.'"

"No, I mean that he's a monkey. We don't have people like that in my world." I shake my head at him.

"Really? That's weird. Just wait 'till you see a fishman!" He giggles.

"U-Um... guys..." Nami's voice quivers, and it's just now that I've noticed everyone's silence. Everyone, and I mean everyone, even the turtle-monster, is looking at the sky.

"What's the matter... with..." The words die in my throat as I turn to look in the same direction.

They're huge.

Three massive shadows that tower high into the sky, taller than any skyscraper I've ever seen. The imposing figures even loom over the creature that was threatening to sink us, and I realize as I look at the wings on their backs that they are the reason the sun suddenly disappeared.

My blood feels cold. Everyone else feels the same as we gawk and choke on the air in our throats, the natural reactions of our body fighting each other as muscles tense and urge us to move, while our brain tells us to keep still.

Nobody moves. Nobody breathes. Sweat is dripping from our necks and faces.

Then, a hulking figure begins to move. Two more appear out of the mist behind it; all of them bearing spears. The first figure begins to raise its own, slowly, readily preparing for an attack.

This was it. We were going to die.

Then, both captains break free from the intensity of the moment, and Luffy nearly ruptures my eardrums with his outburst from beside me.

"Sea monsters!" The cry seems to initiate a wake-up call.

The boys scramble for the oars, and it only takes a second before they're aggressively rowing everyone away from the danger. The wood creaks and bellows as we paddle over the waves, skipping and leaping with every harsh row. But they don't stop, all desperately working in sync as we speed away from the darkness and toward the light.

Nobody says anything, there's only the sound of the whipping wind and the grunts of those who are pushing us to safety. I sit in the same spot, staring at the figures that remain, still staring at the spot even when we manage to get to somewhere brighter; and I don't bother to move even when we eventually lose sight of them.

This world was insane.

Next Part (10)

#luffy #luffy x reader #monkey d. luffy #one piece #one piece luffy #monkey d luffy

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