Just before Bill took to the air the idea struck him that they would probably do a lot better with the ship nearer to shore, and since time was of the essence, in two pulls he ripped the anchor out of the water.
Ignoring the surprised shouts from Miyagi, the trio, Yoko, and her clones, he then used the rope to tow the ship the entirety of some several hundred meters until it was barely more than a stones-throw away from the sandy beach.
Getting out of the water, Bill saw firsthand the preparations Sasha had made, while he had been battling Vergo underwater, she had been working hard herself.
The new encampment on the beach had cannibalized much of the pirates’ old camp. There were some thirty crude cots holding wounded Marines with only light linen canopies to protect them against the mid-day sun.
Walking around the place quickly to find his Lieutenants, Bill saw that most of the pirates had been bound by ropes and put in uniformly shaped pits. These pits would have been undoubtedly dug out by Pearson, Bill thought.
Nearing the only large tent still standing he heard familiar voices and entered without prompt. His entry caused a brief stir inside and in a second, he was standing in middle of a semi-circle surrounded Sasha, Pearson, and Willy.
The last several hours had been hard and they had all seen better days, moving her hand away from her longsword, Sasha was the first to speak: “And the traitor?”
Nodding his head, Bill said that Vergo was ‘taken care of’ and looking around he found the four figures of Blamenco, Fossa, McGuy, and Karma bound in rope and chains. They were all awake and besides Blamenco who was moaning pitifully, they were staring daggers into him.
Seeing where his eyes were going, Pearson spoke up quickly: “We were deciding what to do with them, listen, Captain, the situation is so that dangerous that Willy and I want to take them in Dead, but the Lieutenant was stubborn insisting that they live!”
“The cages on the ship won’t hold the four.” Willy said in speculation.
“And I told the two of you that it was the Captain who would decide their fates! What is it that you can’t understand about that?!”
Since they had all said their piece, they looked at Bill and he said decisively.
“We’ll move Blamenco into the seastone cage on the ship and put his cuffs on McGuy. Fossa and Karma will just have to be tied tighter for the time being.”
Though neither Pearson nor Willy agreed with this, they didn’t interject when Bill continued to say: “we need to move the wounded to the ship. Miyagi only has a couple more hours until he crashes.”
“Is it that bad?” asked Pearson who hadn’t seen the carnage caused by Vergo.
“Hm!” Bill answered gruffly and then said: “It’s bad, and I have a feeling it’ll get worse.”
Before Pearson could ask why, Sasha cut in and said “Right, let’s hurry then” and the careful process of loading the injured Marines on sleds began.
Out of an original crew of some 110, thirty had been killed and 55 more had been seriously wounded. Most galling of all was that 28-out-of-30 killed and 17-out-of-55 seriously wounded had been done solely by Vergo.
Many of the wounded on the island were the melee fighting Fish-men, but at least their thick skins and strong physiques would see that they’d fully recover.
For the most part the human crew had no such benefits, the men and women left on the ship were there due to the fact that Bill knew their vulnerabilities and didn’t want them in harms reach!
Moving the Marines off the beach and back onto the ship, Bill began feeling more and more anxious. ‘I know I’m missing something…’ he thought to himself while transporting the injured and dead pirates off the Frontier Run.
They were down to an only somewhat moderately healthy crew of 25. Most of those were Fish-men and Bill had no grand illusions that he’d be able to bring all these pirates to Justice.
Minutes turned into hours and as the second to last batch of wounded Marines were being loaded on the dinghies, Bill heard Yoko cry out in a chorus of dozens of voices: “SHIP AHOY!”
Turning his head towards the mouth of the bay, Bill watched a huge white ship pull into the harbor and it finally hit him… ‘Vergo claimed he was calling reinforcements!’
Not knowing who or what was on the ship, the only thing he could see was that it was clearly wasn’t a Marine vessel.
Though at this point that probably wouldn’t have mattered, Bill called out to the crew: “Load the King Cannons! Fire At Will!”
The Frontier Run had two of the huge guns on it, and thanks to Nelson’s inclination they had both been pointed towards the open sea.
Running back and forth to grab more people, Bill heard the first cannon go off while taking to the air with his wounded soldier, he watched in slow motion while the streak of smoke homed in on the large ship.
Getting closer and closer, Bill was still in mid air when he saw an absolute giant of a man jump into the air and collide with the shell. A huge explosion shook the air above the harbor, tossing the ships back and forth and Bill landed on the Frontier Run wide-eyed.
Adjusting his eyes to see further, the large man who smashed the shell had a body full of diamonds, and Bill could easily recognize him.
Wanted Dead or Alive, “Diamond” Jozu, 900m Beli!
Looking around the harbor before going back to land, Bill pointed out to one of the Fish-men manning the guns and spoke deeply: “Forget Their Ship! Blast A Hole Through The Side Of The Mountain!”
Getting the ‘Yes Sir’ that he had ingrained into the Fish-men crew, Bill jumped back towards the land and shouted to Sasha: “No Time! Get Them On The Ship!!”
Landing down himself, Bill picked up three of the remaining eight Marines, through them over his shoulder and jumped back.
Seeing the huge white ship even closer now, hearing King Cannons fire and stone crumble, he hollered for the Fish-men to take ropes and pull the ship out to sea.
With just a couple more Marines to grab, Sasha and Bill landed on the island at virtually the same time and turned when they heard a crash on the sand not too far from them.
The first figure they saw through the dust came on fast, and wielding a long saber, aimed to cut Bill’s head off. Drawing her longsword, Sasha barely caught the pirate and Bill thought – Wanted Dead or Alive, Haruta, 300m Beli!
His astonishment of another two Division Commanders showing up was not long lived as he felt the ground shake and heard a stampede heading his way. In that moment, he barely shouted out ‘Draw Back!” before he was tackled by the midsection and plowed deep into the ground.
Holding onto the giant man’s neck in an upward choke with his right arm, Bills sides were being raked with awkward hits as he tried to pound Jozu’s back with his left fist.
This stalemate meters underground couldn’t last long, and once Jozu got his bearings, Bill was hit so hard the air was knocked out of him, then feeling a huge hand grab his left forearm he was flung upwards.
Giving a sideways kick that connected to Jozu’s chin while he was being flung around, Bill was fighting for dear life.
Unlike against Blamenco or Vergo who were only moderately stronger than he, Jozu was on another level, and it was taking every dirty move and every ounce of primal ‘fight or flight’ reaction that Bill could muster to just not be pummeled to his death.
Sending a thumb into the giant pirate’s eye, Bill followed it with the hardest headbutt he could manage, and shocked the Division Commander when his nose was busted.
The shock having his nose busted coincided with the feeling that his Devil Fruit had been nullified, and in a rage the Division Commander threw Bill by the arm hundreds of meters away from the shoreline.
Crashing through trees and landing against hard stone, Bill compressed his body like he had done merely hours before, and being relatively uninjured he was able to get his bearings just in time to see Jozu’s giant 16ft tall frame burst through the foliage.
Intending to strike with a double ground pounding, like a gorilla, Bill used Jozu’s upraised arms to spring from the ground and struck the big man’s little legs with a flying leg kick. Dodging out Jozu’s reach by barely a hairs breath, he tumbled on the ground for a moment before using Moon Walk to escape.
In less than a second, Bill was 15 meters off the ground, and when he dared to hope that he was free of the 3rd Division Commander, a brown object appeared in his periphery vision and before he could react, he was instantly being knocked back down.
The explosion of splinters made it immediately clear what had happened, when he took to the air Jozu had hit him with a tree!
Unable to dodge this time, Bill was grabbed by the front of his Coat of Justice, and in a flurry pounded and punched against the pirate’s face.
Against Bill who could tear iron cogs apart with his bare hands, Jozu’s face withstood the beating with barely a bloody nose and swollen lip before he let out a “ERHH!” and followed through with a massive headbutt.
Trying to avoid it, Bill was too late and was hit square face. For the first time in longer than he could remember, he saw stars and lost control of his body.
Squirting blood and snot from his nose, Bill felt that he had even lost two front teeth!
With alarm bells ringing inside his head, he regained focus just in time to that Jozu wasn’t done, and when the pirate aimed for another head bashing, Bill grew his fingernails out into sharp spikes.
This time, he was able to just avoid the headbutt, and using his fingernails, Bill raked across the Division Commanders eyes.
Howling in agony, Jozu’s grip loosened just enough to allow Bill to struggle free, and while he hit the ground and started to run away, Sasha was in the final moments of her own battle against a new kind of foe.
“Three Sides Divide, TRIANGLE SLASH!” she roared, and wielding her blackened longsword hoped to buy enough time for Broodus and Minke to make it back to the ship.
One thing about whale Fish-men was their notion for ‘pod’ integrity, the pod would stay together in almost any situation, and when they were attacked by the pirates, two of the Fish-men returned to the island to gather the remaining couple wounded Marines.
For Sasha’s part, she ‘only’ had to hold off this newly arrived Division Commander.
The first cut she defended against had nicked her cherished longsword, and so for the last several minutes she had relied on her Haki to just barely defend the whirlwind of cuts and slashes dished out by Haruta.
Taking the three slashes in stride, Haruta deflected them before he jumped in the air and performed a spinning slash that Sasha was forced to avoid altogether.
Breathing heavily, she heard a series of bangs from where the monster pirate and thrown Bill and seeing that the ship had cleared the harbor out of the corner of her eye, she hoped for the best and began to run towards the far side of the island.
“Do Swordsmen Run From Battle?!” called out the Division Commander, making Sasha bite her lip and force herself to continue retreating.
She had never run from any fight, and doing so now almost made her cry in frustration. She knew that Bill had told her to run, and presumably, that was because he wasn’t sure that he’d make it back. If that was the case then she had to be on the ship to protect the rest of the crew.
With Ricky missing an arm, with Nelson lying half dead with a hole in his neck, and with most of the rest of the crew in terrible condition, it was imperative that she be there once they got into open water.
Dodging side to side and counter striking whenever she was able, Sasha knew she couldn’t use her Pulse Boots just yet until she finally had crossed as close to the ship as the shore would take her.
Jumping through the air, she was followed closely by the pirate and when he almost got her, she heard a chorus of voices yell out: “Get Down Big Sis!”
Realizing who it was, Sasha plunged down just in time to avoid eight cannon balls, two of which hit their mark and forced Haruta back.
Now some distance from the shoreline, Sasha swam and was met by one of the Fish-men who became her escort, seeing her safe through the open water.
Getting to the ship, she crawled onboard and was met with some thirty small pairs of curious eyes, and she knew what they were wanting to know.
“… I don’t know. I’m sure he’ll catch up.”
“YOU LEFT HIM?!” a chorus of Yoko’s rang out, mimicking someone else’s same concern earlier that day.
But Sasha was not the unknown Vergo and met with such a tone, she snapped back albeit somewhat feebly: “That was Whitebeards 3rd Division Commander! The Captain ORDERED us to fall back, don’t you think of questioning his decision! Now go unfurl the sails!”
Hearing something that she obviously didn’t like, Yoko’s eyes began to turn red. Not from crying, but from some other mechanism, and just as she was about to start acting up, another splash was heard.
Looking towards the side of the ship where the noise came from, the few able bodied Marines cheered when they saw Bill.
Though he was dirty and bloodied, though his cloths were ripped into shreds, at this moment he was the sweetest sight to behold.
Leaning back against the railing, he said quickly: “Yoko the sails!”
“OooK Bill!” a bunch of thirteen-year-old clones rang out.
Then with a “huff!” Bill got up and turned back towards the island. Seeing the giant white ship coming out of the harbor to follow after them, he sat back down and cursed under his breath.
UberNuber If you enjoy the fanfic please hit the heart icon and consider leaving a rating!
Whew, that was a close call! and Yoko's fruit will be described better in the coming chapters, look forward to it!
Jozu
Spoiler [collapse]Haruta
Spoiler [collapse]
Just before Bill took to the air the idea struck him that they would probably do a lot better with the ship nearer to shore, and since time was of the essence, in two pulls he ripped the anchor out of the water.
Ignoring the surprised shouts from Miyagi, the trio, Yoko, and her clones, he then used the rope to tow the ship the entirety of some several hundred meters until it was barely more than a stones-throw away from the sandy beach.
Getting out of the water, Bill saw firsthand the preparations Sasha had made, while he had been battling Vergo underwater, she had been working hard herself.
The new encampment on the beach had cannibalized much of the pirates’ old camp. There were some thirty crude cots holding wounded Marines with only light linen canopies to protect them against the mid-day sun.
Walking around the place quickly to find his Lieutenants, Bill saw that most of the pirates had been bound by ropes and put in uniformly shaped pits. These pits would have been undoubtedly dug out by Pearson, Bill thought.
Nearing the only large tent still standing he heard familiar voices and entered without prompt. His entry caused a brief stir inside and in a second, he was standing in middle of a semi-circle surrounded Sasha, Pearson, and Willy.
The last several hours had been hard and they had all seen better days, moving her hand away from her longsword, Sasha was the first to speak: “And the traitor?”
Nodding his head, Bill said that Vergo was ‘taken care of’ and looking around he found the four figures of Blamenco, Fossa, McGuy, and Karma bound in rope and chains. They were all awake and besides Blamenco who was moaning pitifully, they were staring daggers into him.
Seeing where his eyes were going, Pearson spoke up quickly: “We were deciding what to do with them, listen, Captain, the situation is so that dangerous that Willy and I want to take them in Dead, but the Lieutenant was stubborn insisting that they live!”
“The cages on the ship won’t hold the four.” Willy said in speculation.
“And I told the two of you that it was the Captain who would decide their fates! What is it that you can’t understand about that?!”
Since they had all said their piece, they looked at Bill and he said decisively.
“We’ll move Blamenco into the seastone cage on the ship and put his cuffs on McGuy. Fossa and Karma will just have to be tied tighter for the time being.”
Though neither Pearson nor Willy agreed with this, they didn’t interject when Bill continued to say: “we need to move the wounded to the ship. Miyagi only has a couple more hours until he crashes.”
“Is it that bad?” asked Pearson who hadn’t seen the carnage caused by Vergo.
“Hm!” Bill answered gruffly and then said: “It’s bad, and I have a feeling it’ll get worse.”
Before Pearson could ask why, Sasha cut in and said “Right, let’s hurry then” and the careful process of loading the injured Marines on sleds began.
Out of an original crew of some 110, thirty had been killed and 55 more had been seriously wounded. Most galling of all was that 28-out-of-30 killed and 17-out-of-55 seriously wounded had been done solely by Vergo.
Many of the wounded on the island were the melee fighting Fish-men, but at least their thick skins and strong physiques would see that they’d fully recover.
For the most part the human crew had no such benefits, the men and women left on the ship were there due to the fact that Bill knew their vulnerabilities and didn’t want them in harms reach!
Moving the Marines off the beach and back onto the ship, Bill began feeling more and more anxious. ‘I know I’m missing something…’ he thought to himself while transporting the injured and dead pirates off the Frontier Run.
They were down to an only somewhat moderately healthy crew of 25. Most of those were Fish-men and Bill had no grand illusions that he’d be able to bring all these pirates to Justice.
Minutes turned into hours and as the second to last batch of wounded Marines were being loaded on the dinghies, Bill heard Yoko cry out in a chorus of dozens of voices: “SHIP AHOY!”
Turning his head towards the mouth of the bay, Bill watched a huge white ship pull into the harbor and it finally hit him… ‘Vergo claimed he was calling reinforcements!’
Not knowing who or what was on the ship, the only thing he could see was that it was clearly wasn’t a Marine vessel.
Though at this point that probably wouldn’t have mattered, Bill called out to the crew: “Load the King Cannons! Fire At Will!”
The Frontier Run had two of the huge guns on it, and thanks to Nelson’s inclination they had both been pointed towards the open sea.
Running back and forth to grab more people, Bill heard the first cannon go off while taking to the air with his wounded soldier, he watched in slow motion while the streak of smoke homed in on the large ship.
Getting closer and closer, Bill was still in mid air when he saw an absolute giant of a man jump into the air and collide with the shell. A huge explosion shook the air above the harbor, tossing the ships back and forth and Bill landed on the Frontier Run wide-eyed.
Adjusting his eyes to see further, the large man who smashed the shell had a body full of diamonds, and Bill could easily recognize him.
Wanted Dead or Alive, “Diamond” Jozu, 900m Beli!
Looking around the harbor before going back to land, Bill pointed out to one of the Fish-men manning the guns and spoke deeply: “Forget Their Ship! Blast A Hole Through The Side Of The Mountain!”
Getting the ‘Yes Sir’ that he had ingrained into the Fish-men crew, Bill jumped back towards the land and shouted to Sasha: “No Time! Get Them On The Ship!!”
Landing down himself, Bill picked up three of the remaining eight Marines, through them over his shoulder and jumped back.
Seeing the huge white ship even closer now, hearing King Cannons fire and stone crumble, he hollered for the Fish-men to take ropes and pull the ship out to sea.
With just a couple more Marines to grab, Sasha and Bill landed on the island at virtually the same time and turned when they heard a crash on the sand not too far from them.
The first figure they saw through the dust came on fast, and wielding a long saber, aimed to cut Bill’s head off. Drawing her longsword, Sasha barely caught the pirate and Bill thought – Wanted Dead or Alive, Haruta, 300m Beli!
His astonishment of another two Division Commanders showing up was not long lived as he felt the ground shake and heard a stampede heading his way. In that moment, he barely shouted out ‘Draw Back!” before he was tackled by the midsection and plowed deep into the ground.
Holding onto the giant man’s neck in an upward choke with his right arm, Bills sides were being raked with awkward hits as he tried to pound Jozu’s back with his left fist.
This stalemate meters underground couldn’t last long, and once Jozu got his bearings, Bill was hit so hard the air was knocked out of him, then feeling a huge hand grab his left forearm he was flung upwards.
Giving a sideways kick that connected to Jozu’s chin while he was being flung around, Bill was fighting for dear life.
Unlike against Blamenco or Vergo who were only moderately stronger than he, Jozu was on another level, and it was taking every dirty move and every ounce of primal ‘fight or flight’ reaction that Bill could muster to just not be pummeled to his death.
Sending a thumb into the giant pirate’s eye, Bill followed it with the hardest headbutt he could manage, and shocked the Division Commander when his nose was busted.
The shock having his nose busted coincided with the feeling that his Devil Fruit had been nullified, and in a rage the Division Commander threw Bill by the arm hundreds of meters away from the shoreline.
Crashing through trees and landing against hard stone, Bill compressed his body like he had done merely hours before, and being relatively uninjured he was able to get his bearings just in time to see Jozu’s giant 16ft tall frame burst through the foliage.
Intending to strike with a double ground pounding, like a gorilla, Bill used Jozu’s upraised arms to spring from the ground and struck the big man’s little legs with a flying leg kick. Dodging out Jozu’s reach by barely a hairs breath, he tumbled on the ground for a moment before using Moon Walk to escape.
In less than a second, Bill was 15 meters off the ground, and when he dared to hope that he was free of the 3rd Division Commander, a brown object appeared in his periphery vision and before he could react, he was instantly being knocked back down.
The explosion of splinters made it immediately clear what had happened, when he took to the air Jozu had hit him with a tree!
Unable to dodge this time, Bill was grabbed by the front of his Coat of Justice, and in a flurry pounded and punched against the pirate’s face.
Against Bill who could tear iron cogs apart with his bare hands, Jozu’s face withstood the beating with barely a bloody nose and swollen lip before he let out a “ERHH!” and followed through with a massive headbutt.
Trying to avoid it, Bill was too late and was hit square face. For the first time in longer than he could remember, he saw stars and lost control of his body.
Squirting blood and snot from his nose, Bill felt that he had even lost two front teeth!
With alarm bells ringing inside his head, he regained focus just in time to that Jozu wasn’t done, and when the pirate aimed for another head bashing, Bill grew his fingernails out into sharp spikes.
This time, he was able to just avoid the headbutt, and using his fingernails, Bill raked across the Division Commanders eyes.
Howling in agony, Jozu’s grip loosened just enough to allow Bill to struggle free, and while he hit the ground and started to run away, Sasha was in the final moments of her own battle against a new kind of foe.
“Three Sides Divide, TRIANGLE SLASH!” she roared, and wielding her blackened longsword hoped to buy enough time for Broodus and Minke to make it back to the ship.
One thing about whale Fish-men was their notion for ‘pod’ integrity, the pod would stay together in almost any situation, and when they were attacked by the pirates, two of the Fish-men returned to the island to gather the remaining couple wounded Marines.
For Sasha’s part, she ‘only’ had to hold off this newly arrived Division Commander.
The first cut she defended against had nicked her cherished longsword, and so for the last several minutes she had relied on her Haki to just barely defend the whirlwind of cuts and slashes dished out by Haruta.
Taking the three slashes in stride, Haruta deflected them before he jumped in the air and performed a spinning slash that Sasha was forced to avoid altogether.
Breathing heavily, she heard a series of bangs from where the monster pirate and thrown Bill and seeing that the ship had cleared the harbor out of the corner of her eye, she hoped for the best and began to run towards the far side of the island.
“Do Swordsmen Run From Battle?!” called out the Division Commander, making Sasha bite her lip and force herself to continue retreating.
She had never run from any fight, and doing so now almost made her cry in frustration. She knew that Bill had told her to run, and presumably, that was because he wasn’t sure that he’d make it back. If that was the case then she had to be on the ship to protect the rest of the crew.
With Ricky missing an arm, with Nelson lying half dead with a hole in his neck, and with most of the rest of the crew in terrible condition, it was imperative that she be there once they got into open water.
Dodging side to side and counter striking whenever she was able, Sasha knew she couldn’t use her Pulse Boots just yet until she finally had crossed as close to the ship as the shore would take her.
Jumping through the air, she was followed closely by the pirate and when he almost got her, she heard a chorus of voices yell out: “Get Down Big Sis!”
Realizing who it was, Sasha plunged down just in time to avoid eight cannon balls, two of which hit their mark and forced Haruta back.
Now some distance from the shoreline, Sasha swam and was met by one of the Fish-men who became her escort, seeing her safe through the open water.
Getting to the ship, she crawled onboard and was met with some thirty small pairs of curious eyes, and she knew what they were wanting to know.
“… I don’t know. I’m sure he’ll catch up.”
“YOU LEFT HIM?!” a chorus of Yoko’s rang out, mimicking someone else’s same concern earlier that day.
But Sasha was not the unknown Vergo and met with such a tone, she snapped back albeit somewhat feebly: “That was Whitebeards 3rd Division Commander! The Captain ORDERED us to fall back, don’t you think of questioning his decision! Now go unfurl the sails!”
Hearing something that she obviously didn’t like, Yoko’s eyes began to turn red. Not from crying, but from some other mechanism, and just as she was about to start acting up, another splash was heard.
Looking towards the side of the ship where the noise came from, the few able bodied Marines cheered when they saw Bill.
Though he was dirty and bloodied, though his cloths were ripped into shreds, at this moment he was the sweetest sight to behold.
Leaning back against the railing, he said quickly: “Yoko the sails!”
“OooK Bill!” a bunch of thirteen-year-old clones rang out.
Then with a “huff!” Bill got up and turned back towards the island. Seeing the giant white ship coming out of the harbor to follow after them, he sat back down and cursed under his breath.
UberNuber If you enjoy the fanfic please hit the heart icon and consider leaving a rating!
Whew, that was a close call! and Yoko's fruit will be described better in the coming chapters, look forward to it!
Jozu
Spoiler [collapse]Haruta
Spoiler [collapse]