Following along the White Tiger over the next couple weeks, the two crews became more and more familiar with one another.
Zephyr spent a lot of time on the Frontier Run. Initially fascinated by the Fish-men Marines and the recovering Boss, he began to act like a grandpa to the more-and-more mischievous Yoko. He didn’t know what her Devil Fruit was, only that it showed the tell-tale signs of being a Mythical Zoan.
When Bill had asked if he knew anything about it, the former Admiral had just said: “It’s hard to say, that Fruit could have laid dormant for a thousand years before it was found. Who knows what was running around back then.”
If Devil Fruits were made from dreams, desires, and other emotions as Dr. Vegapunk suggested then this was very true, and Bill wondered where the more ‘evil’ Fruits were.
Aggression, sickness, lying, etc. were all clearly subject to those things that Vegapunk believed created the ‘Devils’ in the first place, but he had never been able to get a straight answer as to where these Fruits existed.
Even Zephyr, who seemed to little incentive to hold anything back after the attack on his training ship, deflected the question when Bill asked if he had ever heard of a ‘War’ or ‘Mind Control’ Fruit.
Besides these things, Zephyr been an open book for Bill to prod information from. He particularly wanted to know why Blamenco and Vergo became stronger while using Haki.
For the former Marineford Instructor, this was an easy question and he assumed it natural that Bill just hadn’t awakened the ability. Afterall, many times the naturally stronger a person was correlated with how hard it was to manifest Haki – the simple reasoning being that a naturally powerful person would find it harder to be in a serious struggle, and Haki tended to manifest during times of hardship.
It was much to Zephyr’s surprise when Bill showed that he had Haki, and furthermore that Bill’s Haki was somehow both more and less advanced. After seeing this, he had Bill do a number of tests, including both nullifying Ain’s Return-Return from working in the first place, and then reversing the aging that the ability caused.
The most useful ability that Zephyr had Bill try out was to ‘control his own presence’ by using what Bill called his ‘Third Eye.’
Because Bill could see Devil Fruit entities, Zephyr hypothesized that he should be able to see or feel whenever Haki was being used, and thanks to this, if he could control his presence then he would be able to completely prevent others around him from seeing into the future!
“That’s Red Hair’s power…” Zephyr had told him and continued: “we call it ‘Observation Killing’ and it’s a real devil’s curse when used against someone skilled in Observation Haki.
Even though we know about it, not one of us has ever figured out how it works. In the end, Haki is based on your spirit and though there are general similarities among people, it’s understandable that some people’s spirit is a little different.”
Agreeing to this, Bill said ‘Right, in the end we’re all still human’ and Zephyr nodded.
“You also need to bear in mind that even if you do learn Observation Killing, that won’t help you against Armament Haki. If you can’t use strengthening yourself, your only solution would be to become so naturally strong that it doesn’t matter…” then he added with a shrug: “but that’s easier said than done.”
This was indeed what Bill planned to do, he would build state of the art training equipment on New Haven and then upgrade his ships training rooms.
He had defeated Blamenco squarely but only won against Vergo thanks to using his advanced Life Return. Then, when he fought against Jozu he had barely been able to break that behemoths grip – even having to resort to ‘dirty’ fighting tactics.
In Bill’s mind, if he lost to someone who was more skilled than he then OK, but given his abilities, he should never be at such a disadvantage in terms of raw strength again.
However, this line of discussion made him want to know: “If a person can use Observation Killing, what about Armament Killing?”
“Armament Killing?” Zephyr asked back with a raised eyebrow before dismissing it: “I could hypothesize how Observation Killing would work because Observation is an external use of Haki, but since Armament is an internal use of Haki, I couldn’t say… I’m not even sure if that would be possible.
Shrugging to this, Bill decided he wouldn’t dwell on it. Observation Killing was already a huge boon and with the help of Zephyr he was able to feel Haki more and more in the same way he could feel Devil Fruits.
All in all, meeting Zephyr had been a huge benefit but that didn’t mean Bill found the man to be faultless. Sometimes the former Admiral would make harsh side comments about Marineford and once he had shocked Bill by claiming to support the outright and immediate execution of captured pirates.
The old man loved and was generous to his friends but hated to death his enemies.
While Bill spent time with Zephyr, the situation of the rest of the crew was also improving.
Miyagi had woken up and besides the crew members with broken backs and similar long-term injuries, most of the men and women on board could move around enough to care for themselves. Nothing could bring the dead back to life, but the cloud of depression was slowly lifting from the ship day by day.
This upwards trend had only stopped when Vergo woke from his coma. Unsurprisingly, most of the ship wanted blood and when Bill denied it to them, their anger somewhat shifted to himself.
Despite their anger there was nothing to be done about it. Bill would not allow the former Vice Admiral to be lynched, and truthfully thought that even if the crew tried to do so behind his back many of them would die in the process.
So to protect everyone involved he got together with his Lieutenants and had the man watched around the clock.
Using their only two pair of seastone cuffs, Bill had bound Vergo’s hands and feet and chained him to the cell wall with only barely enough slack to reach the toilet. Knowing the chains wouldn’t hold the former Vice Admiral, nonetheless, they would be useful to buy time in case he attempted a jail break.
After a period of a week, Vergo was more and more ‘there’, and being only a couple days from Prison Island, Bill decided he was healthy enough to be interrogated.
Bringing in Zephyr, Ain, and Sasha as a witnesses, he couldn’t have imagined that Vergo would try to claw out mutual destruction in the face of defeat as he dragged the man out of the prison cell and up towards the interrogation room.
Over the years Bill had interrogated many pirates, it always started with the standardized questions revolving around ‘who, when, where, and why’ then from there would move to more substantive questioning.
So, after securing Vergo’s waist-chains to latches on the floor, Bill took his seat without looking at the others and started: “Do you understand why you’re under arrest?”
Looking up at Bill, and then Zephyr, Vergo directed his comment at the latter: “Instructor Zephyr, this Captain lies. He’s betrayed me. He wanted to start a war with Whitebeard after what happened to ‘Fire Fist’ Ace and now he’s using- “That’s not going to work.” Interrupted Bill.
In fact, had Bill not stumbled across Zephyr when he did then there would have been some chance that this sort of story would have worked. Bill was only a ‘Science Division’ Captain and outside of his family name was virtually unknown to anyone at Marineford a mere couple months ago.
Vergo on the other hand had been in the Marines nearly two decades and spent most of that time stationed in one of the most dangerous bases. G-5 was at a crossroads between the territories of three Emperors and by eventually working his way up to become the bases leader, it was easy to just how much the Vice Admiral had contributed.
This contribution had made ‘Demon Bamboo’ Vergo a household name.
However, the man’s luck ran out twice and there was no coming back from it. First it was because he had underestimated Bill. Second it was because despite his contributions, ‘Vice Admiral’ Vergo was not more influential than ‘Admiral’ Zephyr.
Zephyr had clearly seen the state of the ship and over the last three weeks had a mixture of Ain, Binz, and Shuzo make subtle conversations to find out what really happened.
Bill had learned about this almost immediately thanks to Shuzo questioning Willy, as Willy had not been officially given any rank but was one of the cleverest whale Fish-men, he was a natural target for striking up a conversation.
With nothing to hide he just let it go on, and now weeks later, Vergo’s appeals would not be listened to.
Now, stumped by Bills interruption and Zephyr apathy, Vergo changed his tone: “So, you’ll be taking me to Prison Island?”
Ignoring this, Bill said again: “Answer the question, do you understand why you are under arrest?”
“What does it matter? I won’t be jailed for long.”
Shaking his head, Bill said: “You’ve killed over thirty Marines, you’ll be sentenced to death. However, if you cooperate, we will try and reduce the sentence to life without possibility of parole.”
Laughing out loud at this, Vergo quipped: “It was only some Science Division 2nd and 3rd Mates, and once my Lord hears about this, he’ll come straight away to free me.”
“Your Lord?” asked Bill, to which Vergo answered dismissively: “Yes. My Lord and King, even if I told you his name, it wouldn’t do you any good.”
Unbeknownst to Bill, behind him the faces of Zephyr and Ain slowly began to harden, and so plodding along, he retorted: “The Marines are not going to have a person who’s killed as many as you have walk free. If you want to escape the Death Penalty you’re only option here is to tell me why you betrayed us and the name of your ‘King’.”
“Pitiful. You really don’t know how this works, do you?” answered Vergo stoically before continuing: “The World Government only cares about what benefits them, not only will I be freed, but I’m also going to be rewarded for what I’ve done.”
By now, as Vergo spoke, Zephyr and Ain were like firecrackers ready to be set off.
“It’s happened all the time. The good Instructor here knows all about it. Who is my King? Who else is worthy. Instructor Zephyr, you know who I’m speaking about, right?”
Then pausing for a brief second he dropped the bomb: “I’m going to be freed by the newest Warlord, call him the ‘Joker’ or as the Instructor knows him Doflam-
Before Vergo could finish his sentence, Bill felt the former Admiral surge forward, and pivoting out of his chair he bodied the older man. On the other side, Ain was only a step slower to draw her daggers, only to be blocked by Sasha at the last moment before she removed Vergo’s head from his shoulders.
The former Admiral was old and one-armed, but even still, as he and Bill clashed the floor beneath them cracked into spiderwebs across the room.
“Control yourself!” Bill yelled but the older man seemed to hear none of it as he took a swing directed at Bill’s jaw.
Dodging under the punch, he grabbed Zephyr by the waist and lifted upwards. Running through the closed door so hard that it shook the ship, Bill proceeded to grab, pull, and shove Zephyr to the deck.
As everyone on the ship understood that something was happening, inside the room Sasha and Ain traded blow for blow.
“Have you lost your mind?!” Sasha called out only to be answered with: “He has to die!”
Jumping off the walls, Ain attempted to use her superior speed but was met time and again by Sasha’s superior bladework. As two people roughly equal, the stalemate only resulted in further escalation until Sasha called again: “If you don’t stop, don’t blame me!”
When this call was not answered, Sasha coated her longsword in Haki and pressed forward. Breaking through Ain’s guard was a simple enough matter, and hitting the other woman with the hilt of her sword was as merciful as she could afford to be.
But Ain wasn’t Zephyr's second in command for nothing, and as Sasha bust open her nose, she was able to touch her on the shoulder.
Using the Return-Return Fruit, Sasha was reverted to being 13 years old and directly kicked aside just in time for another young voice to be heard shouting: “Big Sis!”
Despite wanting to kill Vergo, Ain was not out of her mind enough to try and kill a kid, so while she was being flooded by dozens of monkey-sized clones, she was hit in the head by a hammer wielded by someone with super strength.
Stumbling from the hit, blood poured from both her nose and the top of her head and seeing that Yoko was about to give the woman the coup-de-gras, Sasha tackled her shouted: “That’s enough!”
Seeing the girls red eyes turn regular, the clones burst into hairs and flew back to Yoko’s body while she answered: “Ok Big Sis!” then spoke to the still-woozy Ain: “Hey! You better watch yourself! Or you’lll gettt the hammer-again!”
Back into the hallways, the way was cleared as Bill grabbed and pulled, dodging strikes by a hairs breath, by the time they reached the deck the fight seemed to be out of the former Admiral.
On the deck Willy, Ricky, and Miyagi stood with the Fish-men across from Shuzo and Binz, seeing this, Bill shoved Zephyr in their direction and spoke unquestionably: “Get off of my ship. Now.”
Almost instantly when he said this, Yoko emerged from the door behind them. Running with Ain lifted over her head, she threw the woman to the ground and glared.
Seeing this, Zephyr looked at Bill coolly and said: “I know you’re doing what you think is right, but he needs to be killed now while we have the chance.”
“The former Vice Admiral is a prisoner who has yet to be sentenced. It would be unjust to take the law into our own hands. I will not allow that to happen to someone in my custody.” Bill answered sternly.
Seeing Bill unmoved, Zephyr picked up Ain and said back: “Then let the blood he spills be on your hands.” And looking up at the quartet, Bill answered solemnly:
“Justice is not served by inflicting injustice. The ends do not justify the means.”
Gritting his teeth, Zephyr left without another word.
UberNuber If you enjoy the fanfic hit the heart icon and consider leaving a rating!
Following along the White Tiger over the next couple weeks, the two crews became more and more familiar with one another.
Zephyr spent a lot of time on the Frontier Run. Initially fascinated by the Fish-men Marines and the recovering Boss, he began to act like a grandpa to the more-and-more mischievous Yoko. He didn’t know what her Devil Fruit was, only that it showed the tell-tale signs of being a Mythical Zoan.
When Bill had asked if he knew anything about it, the former Admiral had just said: “It’s hard to say, that Fruit could have laid dormant for a thousand years before it was found. Who knows what was running around back then.”
If Devil Fruits were made from dreams, desires, and other emotions as Dr. Vegapunk suggested then this was very true, and Bill wondered where the more ‘evil’ Fruits were.
Aggression, sickness, lying, etc. were all clearly subject to those things that Vegapunk believed created the ‘Devils’ in the first place, but he had never been able to get a straight answer as to where these Fruits existed.
Even Zephyr, who seemed to little incentive to hold anything back after the attack on his training ship, deflected the question when Bill asked if he had ever heard of a ‘War’ or ‘Mind Control’ Fruit.
Besides these things, Zephyr been an open book for Bill to prod information from. He particularly wanted to know why Blamenco and Vergo became stronger while using Haki.
For the former Marineford Instructor, this was an easy question and he assumed it natural that Bill just hadn’t awakened the ability. Afterall, many times the naturally stronger a person was correlated with how hard it was to manifest Haki – the simple reasoning being that a naturally powerful person would find it harder to be in a serious struggle, and Haki tended to manifest during times of hardship.
It was much to Zephyr’s surprise when Bill showed that he had Haki, and furthermore that Bill’s Haki was somehow both more and less advanced. After seeing this, he had Bill do a number of tests, including both nullifying Ain’s Return-Return from working in the first place, and then reversing the aging that the ability caused.
The most useful ability that Zephyr had Bill try out was to ‘control his own presence’ by using what Bill called his ‘Third Eye.’
Because Bill could see Devil Fruit entities, Zephyr hypothesized that he should be able to see or feel whenever Haki was being used, and thanks to this, if he could control his presence then he would be able to completely prevent others around him from seeing into the future!
“That’s Red Hair’s power…” Zephyr had told him and continued: “we call it ‘Observation Killing’ and it’s a real devil’s curse when used against someone skilled in Observation Haki.
Even though we know about it, not one of us has ever figured out how it works. In the end, Haki is based on your spirit and though there are general similarities among people, it’s understandable that some people’s spirit is a little different.”
Agreeing to this, Bill said ‘Right, in the end we’re all still human’ and Zephyr nodded.
“You also need to bear in mind that even if you do learn Observation Killing, that won’t help you against Armament Haki. If you can’t use strengthening yourself, your only solution would be to become so naturally strong that it doesn’t matter…” then he added with a shrug: “but that’s easier said than done.”
This was indeed what Bill planned to do, he would build state of the art training equipment on New Haven and then upgrade his ships training rooms.
He had defeated Blamenco squarely but only won against Vergo thanks to using his advanced Life Return. Then, when he fought against Jozu he had barely been able to break that behemoths grip – even having to resort to ‘dirty’ fighting tactics.
In Bill’s mind, if he lost to someone who was more skilled than he then OK, but given his abilities, he should never be at such a disadvantage in terms of raw strength again.
However, this line of discussion made him want to know: “If a person can use Observation Killing, what about Armament Killing?”
“Armament Killing?” Zephyr asked back with a raised eyebrow before dismissing it: “I could hypothesize how Observation Killing would work because Observation is an external use of Haki, but since Armament is an internal use of Haki, I couldn’t say… I’m not even sure if that would be possible.
Shrugging to this, Bill decided he wouldn’t dwell on it. Observation Killing was already a huge boon and with the help of Zephyr he was able to feel Haki more and more in the same way he could feel Devil Fruits.
All in all, meeting Zephyr had been a huge benefit but that didn’t mean Bill found the man to be faultless. Sometimes the former Admiral would make harsh side comments about Marineford and once he had shocked Bill by claiming to support the outright and immediate execution of captured pirates.
The old man loved and was generous to his friends but hated to death his enemies.
While Bill spent time with Zephyr, the situation of the rest of the crew was also improving.
Miyagi had woken up and besides the crew members with broken backs and similar long-term injuries, most of the men and women on board could move around enough to care for themselves. Nothing could bring the dead back to life, but the cloud of depression was slowly lifting from the ship day by day.
This upwards trend had only stopped when Vergo woke from his coma. Unsurprisingly, most of the ship wanted blood and when Bill denied it to them, their anger somewhat shifted to himself.
Despite their anger there was nothing to be done about it. Bill would not allow the former Vice Admiral to be lynched, and truthfully thought that even if the crew tried to do so behind his back many of them would die in the process.
So to protect everyone involved he got together with his Lieutenants and had the man watched around the clock.
Using their only two pair of seastone cuffs, Bill had bound Vergo’s hands and feet and chained him to the cell wall with only barely enough slack to reach the toilet. Knowing the chains wouldn’t hold the former Vice Admiral, nonetheless, they would be useful to buy time in case he attempted a jail break.
After a period of a week, Vergo was more and more ‘there’, and being only a couple days from Prison Island, Bill decided he was healthy enough to be interrogated.
Bringing in Zephyr, Ain, and Sasha as a witnesses, he couldn’t have imagined that Vergo would try to claw out mutual destruction in the face of defeat as he dragged the man out of the prison cell and up towards the interrogation room.
Over the years Bill had interrogated many pirates, it always started with the standardized questions revolving around ‘who, when, where, and why’ then from there would move to more substantive questioning.
So, after securing Vergo’s waist-chains to latches on the floor, Bill took his seat without looking at the others and started: “Do you understand why you’re under arrest?”
Looking up at Bill, and then Zephyr, Vergo directed his comment at the latter: “Instructor Zephyr, this Captain lies. He’s betrayed me. He wanted to start a war with Whitebeard after what happened to ‘Fire Fist’ Ace and now he’s using- “That’s not going to work.” Interrupted Bill.
In fact, had Bill not stumbled across Zephyr when he did then there would have been some chance that this sort of story would have worked. Bill was only a ‘Science Division’ Captain and outside of his family name was virtually unknown to anyone at Marineford a mere couple months ago.
Vergo on the other hand had been in the Marines nearly two decades and spent most of that time stationed in one of the most dangerous bases. G-5 was at a crossroads between the territories of three Emperors and by eventually working his way up to become the bases leader, it was easy to just how much the Vice Admiral had contributed.
This contribution had made ‘Demon Bamboo’ Vergo a household name.
However, the man’s luck ran out twice and there was no coming back from it. First it was because he had underestimated Bill. Second it was because despite his contributions, ‘Vice Admiral’ Vergo was not more influential than ‘Admiral’ Zephyr.
Zephyr had clearly seen the state of the ship and over the last three weeks had a mixture of Ain, Binz, and Shuzo make subtle conversations to find out what really happened.
Bill had learned about this almost immediately thanks to Shuzo questioning Willy, as Willy had not been officially given any rank but was one of the cleverest whale Fish-men, he was a natural target for striking up a conversation.
With nothing to hide he just let it go on, and now weeks later, Vergo’s appeals would not be listened to.
Now, stumped by Bills interruption and Zephyr apathy, Vergo changed his tone: “So, you’ll be taking me to Prison Island?”
Ignoring this, Bill said again: “Answer the question, do you understand why you are under arrest?”
“What does it matter? I won’t be jailed for long.”
Shaking his head, Bill said: “You’ve killed over thirty Marines, you’ll be sentenced to death. However, if you cooperate, we will try and reduce the sentence to life without possibility of parole.”
Laughing out loud at this, Vergo quipped: “It was only some Science Division 2nd and 3rd Mates, and once my Lord hears about this, he’ll come straight away to free me.”
“Your Lord?” asked Bill, to which Vergo answered dismissively: “Yes. My Lord and King, even if I told you his name, it wouldn’t do you any good.”
Unbeknownst to Bill, behind him the faces of Zephyr and Ain slowly began to harden, and so plodding along, he retorted: “The Marines are not going to have a person who’s killed as many as you have walk free. If you want to escape the Death Penalty you’re only option here is to tell me why you betrayed us and the name of your ‘King’.”
“Pitiful. You really don’t know how this works, do you?” answered Vergo stoically before continuing: “The World Government only cares about what benefits them, not only will I be freed, but I’m also going to be rewarded for what I’ve done.”
By now, as Vergo spoke, Zephyr and Ain were like firecrackers ready to be set off.
“It’s happened all the time. The good Instructor here knows all about it. Who is my King? Who else is worthy. Instructor Zephyr, you know who I’m speaking about, right?”
Then pausing for a brief second he dropped the bomb: “I’m going to be freed by the newest Warlord, call him the ‘Joker’ or as the Instructor knows him Doflam-
Before Vergo could finish his sentence, Bill felt the former Admiral surge forward, and pivoting out of his chair he bodied the older man. On the other side, Ain was only a step slower to draw her daggers, only to be blocked by Sasha at the last moment before she removed Vergo’s head from his shoulders.
The former Admiral was old and one-armed, but even still, as he and Bill clashed the floor beneath them cracked into spiderwebs across the room.
“Control yourself!” Bill yelled but the older man seemed to hear none of it as he took a swing directed at Bill’s jaw.
Dodging under the punch, he grabbed Zephyr by the waist and lifted upwards. Running through the closed door so hard that it shook the ship, Bill proceeded to grab, pull, and shove Zephyr to the deck.
As everyone on the ship understood that something was happening, inside the room Sasha and Ain traded blow for blow.
“Have you lost your mind?!” Sasha called out only to be answered with: “He has to die!”
Jumping off the walls, Ain attempted to use her superior speed but was met time and again by Sasha’s superior bladework. As two people roughly equal, the stalemate only resulted in further escalation until Sasha called again: “If you don’t stop, don’t blame me!”
When this call was not answered, Sasha coated her longsword in Haki and pressed forward. Breaking through Ain’s guard was a simple enough matter, and hitting the other woman with the hilt of her sword was as merciful as she could afford to be.
But Ain wasn’t Zephyr's second in command for nothing, and as Sasha bust open her nose, she was able to touch her on the shoulder.
Using the Return-Return Fruit, Sasha was reverted to being 13 years old and directly kicked aside just in time for another young voice to be heard shouting: “Big Sis!”
Despite wanting to kill Vergo, Ain was not out of her mind enough to try and kill a kid, so while she was being flooded by dozens of monkey-sized clones, she was hit in the head by a hammer wielded by someone with super strength.
Stumbling from the hit, blood poured from both her nose and the top of her head and seeing that Yoko was about to give the woman the coup-de-gras, Sasha tackled her shouted: “That’s enough!”
Seeing the girls red eyes turn regular, the clones burst into hairs and flew back to Yoko’s body while she answered: “Ok Big Sis!” then spoke to the still-woozy Ain: “Hey! You better watch yourself! Or you’lll gettt the hammer-again!”
Back into the hallways, the way was cleared as Bill grabbed and pulled, dodging strikes by a hairs breath, by the time they reached the deck the fight seemed to be out of the former Admiral.
On the deck Willy, Ricky, and Miyagi stood with the Fish-men across from Shuzo and Binz, seeing this, Bill shoved Zephyr in their direction and spoke unquestionably: “Get off of my ship. Now.”
Almost instantly when he said this, Yoko emerged from the door behind them. Running with Ain lifted over her head, she threw the woman to the ground and glared.
Seeing this, Zephyr looked at Bill coolly and said: “I know you’re doing what you think is right, but he needs to be killed now while we have the chance.”
“The former Vice Admiral is a prisoner who has yet to be sentenced. It would be unjust to take the law into our own hands. I will not allow that to happen to someone in my custody.” Bill answered sternly.
Seeing Bill unmoved, Zephyr picked up Ain and said back: “Then let the blood he spills be on your hands.” And looking up at the quartet, Bill answered solemnly:
“Justice is not served by inflicting injustice. The ends do not justify the means.”
Gritting his teeth, Zephyr left without another word.
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