One Piece Podfic: Marie D Suesse And The Mystery New Pirate Age!

To those of you who thought that the author was being charitable to Mar for letting her get her father back so easily, the next line should assure you that the author is still a mean, evil and sadistic person.

"I couldn't hear the name properly, but I got a good look at him," Mar's dad told her as he tried to figure out the controls to the slave-collar. "But he was rather stupid-looking, so we might have a chance. I mean—" (at this he shook his head), "—if we weren't slaves at that time we would have laughed at him I think. He looked so ridiculous, walking around with that gold-fish bowl on his head and all."

"Better to be safe than sorry. I hope your cook won't mind. What do you call him again?"

Of course, Mar's dad did mind, but he also introduced himself. "It's Garreth. Garreth Stuart Suesse.

You can call me Garreth, Stuart, or Mr. Suesse, but on no account are the names to be shortened.

So not 'Gary', not 'Stu', and definitely not both of them shortened together."

It wasn't the seated figure who said this, but someone who had been waiting behind the door. The shipwright turned and found himself face to face with a wiry, bespectacled, middle-aged man he knew and hated.

"You again!"

Mr. 'You-Again' however, didn't seemed fazed by this exclamation, and continued speaking calmly. "Knowing that your safe had already been compromised, I'd expected it to be the first thing you'd do after we left. But you didn't.”

"Strange, isn't it? Someone paranoid like you taking the risk that a bunch of pirates wouldn't come back and empty out the contents of your safe? It's almost as though you had some reason to be sure we wouldn't come back..."

For several seconds no one on board moved. Their collective attention was fixed on the den-den mushi. The snail had somehow gained long sweeping eyelashes, and the voice it had taken on, despite sounding forced and harsh, was indisputably of that of a woman.

In fact, as everyone quickly realised, the voice could only belong to one person: THE Woman.

"Squall, your queen commands you to speak!" The den-den mushi was looking more agitated by the minute. "What's going on over there? Do you have them alive or not?"

The door closed behind him, the sound of the lock echoing through the vast room. Mar felt another stab of internal conflict as the rustle of silk indicated St. Magda was standing right above her. But before she could think over whether she wanted to risk looking up again, she found herself being pulled to her feet by St. Magda and then hugged tightly by a pair of shaking hands.

"Marie, are you all right? I am so sorry I hit you, but I had to stop you from giving me away... If he suspects I'm not his daughter we'll both be killed... He is mad and completely heartless. Do you understand? Marie?"

"Oh, how sad for you, the poor misunderstood Tenryuubito. Such a difficult life you must have had." Law voice was dripping with sarcasm.

At this crack, something seemed to snap in Madelyn.

"Would you have done any better if you had been in my place?" she retorted bitterly, her eyes flashing. "I grew up in this screwed-up hellhole of a gilded-cage! From the day I was born to the day I ran away, I was constantly being told I was perfect just the way I was and no one had the right to criticise me or anything I did. I was Tenryuubito! I was special! Everyone else was trash! We formed the world government, we owned the world and therefore we had the right to do anything we wanted!”

"Over and over and over... nothing but people who would tell me what they thought I wanted to hear. Every single time there was anyone in my life who could have set me right, they were made out to be wrong, punished, humiliated, and destroyed in front of me."

"You must introduce me to your charming crew," Gurnarde politely declined the plate of biscuits that was being shared around. "Very kind of you to offer us those comestibles, but no thank you, we do not accept food from humans, do we, Walker?"

Perhaps it was a good thing that the level of Gurnarde's bottle had been steadily going down, because it also reflected the declining level of the mermaid's reserve.

"What is there to say?" said Gurnarde bitterly, "Our King owed Straw-Hat a great debt. His honour would not let them execute the boy. Our entire Neptune army, and many others allies besides, marched against the World Government to save the man who had once upon a time, saved our kingdom. It was a battle the likes of which we will probably never see again.”

"But even with the might of Poseidon on our side, we lost.”

"In the end, after the Straw-Hat's head had been separated from his body and all that was left of us were fleeing from that ocean of blood, the World Government was still not content with their victory. They sent their hunters after us, and tried to cut off the retreat of Straw-Hat's crew."

Mar shrank away fearfully as the ranting continued. But just as abruptly as the rage had flared, it cooled down into moribund muttering.

"No, I must not. King Fukaboshi said we were not to hate the humans for the sins of a few... but just a few... just those few! Those accursed Dragons who control the World Government. They who are fiends in human form! I will hunt them down for what they have done! I will teach them what it is to be the hunted!”

"I will turn their bones into sand... and feed it to their children."

"Walker... you're all right!" Mar was relieved to see the fish-man, now looking like a bandaged rock, back on his feet.

"Walker! You have been injured by the humans! This is unforgivable!" the mermaid said, ignoring the humans momentarily.

Both Mar's father and the Disinfector tensed at this. But Walker's next words put everything right.

"Gurnarde... Little hunams not being enemies. Helping Walker escaping and saving Walker life."

Law was about to say something about the irony of surviving the Marine cannonade only to be seabeast food, but the creature didn't seem intent on eating them. In fact it looked rather familiar... hadn't they stared at that same beast's back in the days before they got to Hawker Island?

As if in response, there was a loud splash, followed by a familiar rumble: "Branchy is finding lost hunams... Good Branchy!"

It was when she had found the stash of treasure that was undoubtedly Nami's when she heard the Voice again. To be specific, it scared the stuffing out of her by whispering nastily in her ear:

"Don't touch that! She'll be aaaangggrrry... It's heerssss..." But when she turned around, no one was there.

"Sunny, can you move us somewhere safer?" said the Disinfector as he walked.

"Need to fix the sails first," was the ghost ship's reply. "Can try after that."

A splash announced the return if their scout. "It was not a lone patrol loitering around. The Marine fleet is surprisingly vast." Gurnarde announced as she wrung the water out of her tattered cloak. "But according to the fish, they've passed us and reached the edge of the fog. We should be safe now."

There was a general sigh of relief on board at this.

"Then we're going to find them!" said the Sunny right after Gurnarde had finished her report. "We're going! Now!"

Monday, July 19 th,

The captain has gone missing. We have searched everywhere, but no one can recall when he disappeared from the ship. We have formed search parties, to no avail. Usopp has suggested contacting our allied pirate crews for help but Zoro is against it, saying this is an internal matter.

I can only hope that is just a silly prank on his part.

We are approaching Loguetown. Even from this distance I can hear the sounds of battle, see the columns of smoke from where the survivors of the first skirmish are engaging the overwhelming Marine forces.

Luffy is not dead yet. We still have a chance.

The Marines cannot be allowed to repeat what they did at Marineford all those years ago. We cannot allow it.

We will not 

allow it.

I

will

not

allow

it.

"I think it's cool too! I wanna ride one!" Luffy's eyes were glinting the same way they did on the subject of 'beams'.

Robin smiled at the absurd mental image that had appeared in her head. "I doubt Drake-san would let you ride him, Luffy. Besides, it is highly unlikely he would have access to one of Chopper's

Rumble Balls, much less three of them."

"Everyone! Come look at this!" Nami's voice called from the galley. Both men quickly rose and went to see what was going on.

Franky, Usopp and Nami were crowded around the galley table, upon which the latest copy of the newspaper had been laid out. The headline of the frontpage screamed: “VICE-ADMIRAL DALMATIAN COMMENTS ON IMPEL-DOWN RAID", but that wasn't the main point of interest for the assembled Straw-Hats. They only had eyes for one thing: the picture of the marine featured below it.

"I'm telling you, that's Chopper's guard point!" Nami insisted, stabbing her finger at what looked like a round ball of pale fur speckled with dots, which was guarding against a group of attacking pirates.

Nami began to read from the article:

"...Monkey D. Madelyn's brazen raid on Impel Down was supposed to have been vengeance for the execution of her brother Monkey D. Luffy. However, our sources indicate that this might actually have been a front for her true purpose.

"According to our correspondent, prior to raiding the infamous gaol, Madelyn had demanded that a member of her crew be freed. However, Vice-Admiral Dalmatian, who is in charge of the auxiliary defense for Impel Down, insisted that the wanted crew member, the Supernova Trafalgar

Law, was never in Impel Down to begin with..."

Law stood up suddenly. "She did WHAT?"

A little distance away, Franky silently welded the shards of Zoro's broken swords together for his headstone.

"Mr. Sogeking, you're still recovering from major surgery. You shouldn't be straining yourself."

"Let me do this. I have to do this," Usopp, who was stamping out the epitaphs, replied stubbornly. "I'm not going to be the only one who didn't do anything for them." Law decided to leave him be.

"I'm telling you, that's Chopper's guard point!" Nami insisted, stabbing her finger at what looked like a round ball of pale fur speckled with dots, which was guarding against a group of attacking pirates.

"Is that Chopper?" Brook echoed.

"No, that's not Chopper," Usopp said, frowning. "It's a marine vice-admiral. A dog zoan by the looks of it."

"You're a lot more composed about this than the rest of your crew, Mr. Soul King."

"This is not my first time losing nakama," the skeleton confided. "Although it is still hard as ever. Losing your crew is never easy. Is it, doctor?" Law looked up sharply at this.

"Pardon me for asking, Law-san, but... why are you here, and alone? What happened to your crew?"

Captain Brook, busy studying a map and planning their next move, thanked the doctor. "Thank you, Law-san. Your continued presence is of course, always welcome, but we'll be happy to take you anywhere you want to go. If you do want to go anywhere, of course."

Several minutes later, Usopp held up his finished piece for everyone to see. A hush fell upon the deck.

"That's kind of scary-looking, Usopp," Chopper commented, eyes widening.

"It makes my blood run cold, except that I no longer have blood. Yohohoho!"

"We're all set," she could hear Franky's voice saying to Brook. "It was a good thing we grabbed those hull pieces from the Shadow Hind's wreck when we did. That Drake guy's ship was a former marine ship, so the sea-stone lining should help hide us from the sea-kings."

"Wait!" came the cry from Franky, who had a pair of spyglasses in his functioning small hand.

"There's something up ahead."

"It's a submarine."

"If we trigger the diversion here, the security team will be preoccupied with protecting the vault and we can take the opportunity to sneak in and find our true goal: Chopper."

Brook scrutinised the plans of Vegapunk's lab and hmm'ed. Franky, who had been laying out their plan of action, was waiting for his input, while Law and Usopp looked on. Nami was sitting quietly in the corner, combing through sheaves of information..

The 'thing' in question looked like half a slave collar, but instead of going around the neck, it seemed to be fused along the nape.

A haunted look appeared in Chopper's eyes. "They called it a puppet-controller implant. Th-they put on me... t-to test... it-it makes me do whatever they tell me to." The traumatized reindeer started shaking as the memories of his time as a test subject resurfaced.

The action seemed to snap Chopper back into his 'Doctor' mode. At least, he stopped falling apart and bundled his patient back into bed instead. "What are you doing getting out of bed? Don't push yourself! Whatever you did to your own heart earlier saved your life, but there was already irreversible damage!"

"—I know! Draw that bird guy from Alabasta next! In Guard Point!” A chorus of giggles and laughter followed shortly after.

Nico Robin looked up from the deck chair, distracted from her journal-writing for the moment. The younger members of the crew (and Brook) were gathered around Usopp. Armed with a drawing pad and pencil, he was doing caricatures for them on demand.

"He's just a giant ball of feathers!" Luffy exploded in laughter when the resident artist had finished.

Not expecting his evasion, Madelyn almost barreled into the ground but managed to recover in time. In fact, she still somehow managed to make her stumble look graceful.

"Doctor Law!" glad cries came from other members of the crew. "We almost thought that the

World Government had you!"

Madelyn gave a nervous little laugh. "What do you mean by that, Jean-Luc? I'm your captain, you're just delirious from this sudden disease—"

"My name is Jean Bart!" snarled the huge pirate furiously. Madelyn's eyes widened and she took a step back.

"Captain? Captain Law?" Bepo was still shaking his head, but there was also clarity and awareness in the talking bear's eyes. "Captain! You're back!"

No one dared to speak. This was highly irregular. Their Captain was known to smirk. Sometimes he would smile smugly and show glee. But he did not laugh. Certainly not in the unrestrained, uncontrollable way he had done earlier.

It took the beeping sound of the heart monitor to break the silence.

"What the—? Captain, Chopper's heart started beating again!"

"Captain! Did you hear? They're executing Straw-Hat Luffy in Loguetown!" Shachi yelled, wildly waving the paper the news coo had just dropped off.

Law smiled in triumph. His cure had worked. Which was a good thing, because being called just

"Doctor Law" by Bepo instead of "Captain" was beginning to get on his nerves.

"Captain, what's going on?" asked Penguin as he looked around, bewildered.

The ship of the Heart Pirates was anchored next to a balmy, tropical island and a joyful party was in full swing. They were celebrating their newest addition to the crew, a member of the fairer sex whom most of them had already fallen head-over-heels in love with.

"Three cheers for our newest nakama," the crew toasted as they raised their frothy mugs of ale. "Three cheers for our brand-new Heart Pirate!" "She's just so cute!" cooed Penguin.

Madelyn responded. "Yes! I'm here! Are you all sick? Don't worry, Doctor Law's back and he's going to heal you all! Law! Heal them!"

"I wasn't talking to you." There was a willful, almost furious tone in Jean Bart's voice. "I was talking to the Captain!"

Madelyn gave a nervous little laugh. "What do you mean by that, Jean-Luc? I'm your captain, you're just delirious from this sudden disease—"

"My name is Jean Bart!" snarled the huge pirate furiously. Madelyn's eyes widened and she took a step back.

At first the crew had been more concerned with saving their captain's life. However, on hooking Law up to the life support and realising that they still needed a skilled doctor, the crew eventually decided to heed their captain's orders.

"The Straw-Hats filled us in on your original plan. Since you were stabilised on the CPB and the fastest way for us to get a doctor for you was to go rescue the Straw-Hats' doctor, we took a gamble."

But Red, or Drake, merely smiled, if such a word could be used to describe the ghost of that expression that had appeared on his now-inhuman face.

"The Straw-Hats used the sea-stone from the wreckage of my ship to cross the Calm-Belt? I didn't know that, thank you. At least some good came out of losing the Shadow Hind back in

Loguetown..."

For the first time ever, Drake's stoic facade crumbled and he stared at her with a look of absolute horror and disbelief.

"Twenty? No, it can't be... a year, maybe a few more, but twenty? I've been here for twenty years...?" he trailed off, overcome. "Damn! No, I know there was that gap after they turned me off, but it can't have been that long!"

"Well you know what they say: 'A worthy friend is a precious treasure and a worthy foe the next best thing*'", Killer said as he sipped his beer through a straw.

Eustass Kid laughed jovially. "So that means Madelyn here's the next best thing to treasure. So true!"

"Kid, we shouldn't party too long. Don't forget that Straw-Hat's gotten a lead on us already." Killer swapped his empty glass for a filled one and transferred his straw into it.

The voice of an old man seated at the bar stopped them cold.

"Don't mess with this guy. I heard he just killed a whole bunch of Tenryuubito guards all by himself. You kids are out of your league."

 "You the coating engineer I contacted?"

"The one and the same. You're lucky, I don't normally hang around Hawker Island. Much prefer Sabaody. But your case interested me. It's not every day you find someone with a stolen

Tenryuubito ship and a lost mermaid wanting to travel to Fishman Island."

Ryuugu Palace, Fishman Island

"Your offence is a serious one," the Minister of the Right said sternly to the young Ammo-Knight before him. "You signed up for the Neptune Army under false pretenses. You deliberately misrepresented yourself to His Majesty."

"Prince Ryuuboshi! Your Majesties!" The Minister jumped to attention as the three princes of the realm entered the room with their escorts in tow. "No need to involve yourselves in such a minor issue, young Princes. It is being taken care of— you, stop that!"

"Mi-Fa-So-La! What seems to be the problem, here?"

"That's enough! I apologise for her impertinence, Your Majesties. She is no doubt desperate for a way out of the mess she is in."

"What has she done, exactly?" Manboshi, the youngest prince, asked curiously.

The Minister of the Right did not look convinced. "Don't lie! You were ashamed and trying to cover up your connection to those criminals!"

The knight looked downcast at this. "I am not proud of whence I came, it is true, but I have not done anything I am personally ashamed of."

"Just a moment, Minister," Fukaboshi interrupted, still frowning. "You have explained the blood connection, but not her crime. Has she been caught attempting to free the prisoners, or done anything that would arouse suspicion of such intentions?"

"Both of you are hopelessly drunk," the off-duty marine informed his two equally off-duty companions.

"Hina is not intoxicated."

The first marine smirked. "And that's Smoker, honest to a fault. Anyway, it's not as if I'm judging you lot or anything. Just as long as you two don't get carried away and end up with some nasty surprise or other nine months down the road. I'm not playing godfather to any unexpected arrivals."

There was the simultaneous smash of two shattered glasses as both Hina and Smoker dropped their drinks in horror at the very notion.

"Just what are you implying, Stamper?" Smoker growled after he had stopped choking on what was left of his beer.

The other, newly-recruited 'Heart Pirates' were amassing, and they were uniformly angry-faced as they backed up the sobbing girl-'captain'. One of them, a green-haired swordsman who seemed suspiciously similar to another certain green-haired swordsman from another crew, stepped forward with a threatening gesture.

"Doctor Law, how can you speak to the captain like that? I, Roronoa D. Squall, wish to teach you a lesson on how to treat our Queen—AUGH!" He gagged as he inhaled Law's accurately aimed jet of spray.

Law noted with disappointment that it was the last of his cure spray. It had been a shame that he hadn't had a time to synthesize more of it. It certainly would have come in handy now.

"Wh-what's happening to me? What have you done? I... I... why am I here? What's going on? Where's my dojo?" the pirate swordsman seemed to be coming out of Madelyn's enthrallment. It also effectively stopped the angry horde, who stopped in a silent, confused mass.

Blood was slowly dripping onto the metal deck of the submarine, much to the horror of the watching Heart Pirates.

It wasn't the gun that had drawn the blood of the pirate captain. In fact, the bullet hadn't even touched the devil-fruit user, who had made good use of his powers to redirect it once it had entered his 'Room' space.

What had drawn the blood was the naked blade of the nodachi that Squall had thrust right through Law's chest.

"You must be wondering 'why?', Dr. Law," Squall whispered viciously, his helpful and friendly demeanour gone. "You thought you had 'cured' me, didn't you? Perhaps you should have considered whether I wanted to be cured or not.”

"I was happy in Queen Madelyn's thrall. And you stole that from me, Doctor. So I wished to the Queen that you would have that one moment of weakness for me to teach you a lesson, and it has been granted."

It was the marine captain. He was standing on a high root of one of the trees, looking down at them. Judging from his grimy condition he appeared to have already been in a fight. Probably with the New Heart Pirates.

"YOU EVIL WITCH!" He looked nothing like he had before, because his whole body was now sporting a forest of white spikes that protruded through his skin.

"How dare you summon your fleet and level my town? Well you have met your match! I have eaten the Bone-Bone fruit and I can alter any part of my skeletal structure. I can even turn them into weapons as you have seen!"

Sure enough, around the bay, the lion-headed ship was sailing on its own and determinedly making its way towards the dock they were on. Mar had never been so happy to see the ghost-ship in her life. Even as it approached them she could see the Mini Merry II being launched out to ferry them back.

"No! It cannot be!" said the captain, who was shakily clawing his way back onto his feet. "The ship of the Pirate King?" Then he became aware of a shadow falling over him.

Actually, a more in-depth explanation can be found many miles away, when a venerable scientist known as Dr. Vegapunk was busy overseeing the results of his latest devil-fruit research.

"So it didn't work out then?"

"No sir!" said the lab technician. "All of our cross-species spliced devil-fruit suddenly failed biologically. Their insides uh... melted, sir."

"Ah," said the famous doctor. "I do hope that pesky pirate who stole one of our spliced results was foolish enough to eat it then. It would have been such an interesting experiment."

Dr. Kusanagi,

Kindly test if damage to the controller produces the same effect. If this is the case we may have to revisit our implant design.

Exercise caution when dealing with existing at-risk subjects. Those with carnivorous zoan fruits are particularly dangerous and not be allowed enter the state.

Any corpses of zoan-type subjects should be incinerated immediately on expiration.

Once your testing is done, send out advisory warnings to all other parties any of our fixed zoans might have been sent to. This includes the Tenryuubito owner of the recently purchased X-10. Regards,

Dr. Vegapunk

"Hey Slashfang! You were right! It is the Thousand Sunny!" said the dark-haired girl to the man as she looked around at the ship.

"Told you so. I saw it from the air and recognized it at once."

"And Pirate Queen-des, who will also be the greatest swordswoman in the world." replied 'Hana', the black-haired woman. (Thankfully, now that the dark-haired girl's name has been established as 'Hana' in the earlier dialogue, we can finally start refering by her name instead of indulging in indiscriminate overusages of banal epithets such as her hair colour or eye-colour.)

"We'll show those no-good abusive parents of ours, won't we? We'll prove them in that they were wrong for laughing at us for our beliefs that we believe in finding One Piece!' 

"Hai! Well yeah, that's history, hun. He nearly got to Raftel, but then he like, got caught and executed. And then his sister, the captain of the Heart Pirates, Monkey D. Madelyn, ended up the Pirate Queen?"

"Except that she too, mysteriously disappeared after that, and their disappearances started the Third New Pirate Age," Slashfang supplemented.

"The Pirate King's ship hasn't been seen for years and we find it! What are the chances? It's fatedes!" said the brunette.

"Yes, Hana. The Thousand Sunny is the only ship that ever made it to Raftel! If we can claim it, that means we're fated to be the next Pirate King!" replied her companion.

"And Pirate Queen-des, who will also be the greatest swordswoman in the world." replied 'Hana', the black-haired woman.

"Watashiwa Sakura D. Hana!" said the swordswoman behind him, equally eager to show off her badass credentials. "I have a bounty of 419 million beli, I ate the Mizu-Mizu No Mi and I also have King's Disposition Haki and I'm going to be the greatest swordswoman the world-des! With my two blades, Kurohebi (that means Black Snake) and the Nidai Kitetsu, I will show the world the stength of my Nitoryu sword style-ryu... des!"

"Monkey D. Luffy was executed?" Her voice was trembling.

"Hai! Well yeah, that's history, hun. He nearly got to Raftel, but then he like, got caught and executed. And then his sister, the captain of the Heart Pirates, Monkey D. Madelyn, ended up the Pirate Queen?"

While one might have thought it strange that he had never encountered this problem before, Mar was correct in that zoan devil fruits do not allow dual-classing between the orders of Mammalia and Aves. So while a hybrid-fruit animal sounds very nice in theory, when you try and mix together biology without fully understanding how it works... it doesn't. And when it doesn't... well, bad things happen.

Actually, a more in-depth explanation can be found many miles away, when a venerable scientist known as Dr. Vegapunk was busy overseeing the results of his latest devil-fruit research.

"So it didn't work out then?"

"No sir!" said the lab technician. "All of our cross-species spliced devil-fruit suddenly failed biologically. Their insides uh... melted, sir."

"What's wrong with you now?" said the woman in annoyance, notcing his sudden change in demeanour. "You're sweating all over the place. Disgusting!"

"It's j-just a little hot here today," the slave salesman said, trying his best to conceal his fear.

"You damned fools! Have you not seen wanted posters of her before? That was Monkey D.

Madelyn, the Pirate Queen!"

"What?"

"But, she disappeared... years ago!"

"Well, she's back now." The salesman reached for his den-den mushi. "I'm calling the Marines.

And you two, get ready and pack everything up, we're closing the shop for the day."

With that, she left, with the slave in tow and the salesman with his knees still shaking.

The guards, seeing the state of their manager, were curious. "Was that woman trouble, boss?"

"That's what we th—"

"You damned fools! Have you not seen wanted posters of her before? That was Monkey D.

Madelyn, the Pirate Queen!"

"What?"

"But, she disappeared... years ago!"

At that moment Mar felt a familiar wave of frustration rush over her. Yes, what the Disinfector said was true but it could not be denied that the whole mistaken identity thing was really getting a bit old.

"Surrender, or die. I can sense that the both of you are devil-fruit users, but I should warn you, I am Admiral Lance D. Imba, the most powerful marine in the World Government! Even the combined might of two normal devil-fruit users such as yourselves will not be a match for my devil-fruit!"

Mar on the other hand, was not so much concerned about where the water attack had come from, but the implications of what she had witnessed. "T-that's Admiral Aokiji's Ice-Ice fruit..."

"Aokiji, that old one-trick pony?" scoffed Admiral Imba, on overhearing her. "The lazy old coot is a relic of an obsolete age! The future belongs to us, the new generation of marines! Witness the New Age of Justice!"

Then there was also that downright bizarre Vice-Admiral. He was apparently a half-giant (or was it a half-giant sea-monkey? Well, half-something-unnatural anyway), and had superhuman strength in addition being able command sea kings with some flute-thing of his. What was his name again?

Oh yeah... Hctib D. Elttli. Odd name.

The Fleet Admiral paused and frowned. What the hell was with all the 'D's in their names, anyway?

"So this is the infamous Pirate Queen? In truth, I was expecting someone with more... presence."

The miserable girl sitting shackled to the chair before the Fleet Admiral did not, indeed, look very impressive. Of course, my saying that Mar currently looked miserable is tantamount to me calling the Grand Line "a little puddle", which is to say, a massive understatement.

"Still not going to say anything are you? What, sea-stone got your tongue?"

Mar just stared unheedingly at the surface of the Fleet Admiral's desk, utterly uncaring of what was going on and what was happening to her. This state, by the way, is called detachment while wallowing in utter depression and despair.

"Suit yourself. It's refreshing to not be interrupted by a bunch of smart-alec subordinates with too much to say anyway. I was going to say though... you look really good for your age, Monkey D. Madelyn. In fact, you still look like you did twenty years ago! I don't suppose you'd share the secret to your youthful looks before we ship you off to Impel down? Between you and me, my wife could use some youngering up."

This was followed with a sudden shriek of horror from the Alu-something girl.

"You mean I've just been rude to a real officer of the Heart Pirates?" The profane girl turned angrily and glared at Mar. "You awful girl, you ruined my chances to join my dream crew!"

Anyway, the girl had finished her torrent of unrepeatable language was now saying to the Heart Pirate:

"Mr. Squall, please forgive me! That imposter tricked me! I didn't know! I'm your biggest fan, really! My dream is to join the Heart Pirates! Please-oh-please put in a good word with The Pirate Queen for me! "

"She's quite a mess, but I'm pretty sure I can have her fixed up in a couple of days... it'll cost'cha a mint though," the old gnarled shipwright said as they walked from the dock where the battered Thousand Sunny had just been examined. A glint of greed appeared in the seasoned craftsman's eye as he took Mar and her 'crew' in. "I take beli, dials, ancient treasure, seastone and any kind of building materials in trade. So watcha got?"

A glint suddenly appeared in long-arm tribesman's eye. "Are you telling me I'm stupid and my safe's no good? Well, tell you what Mr. Know-It-All, are you willing to put your money where your mouth is? You try and open my safe in five minutes! You do it within that time, I'll forgo the difference and fix that damn ship of yours. You lose, you fork over all ya'll got right now." "Absolutely not."

Realising the game was up, the shipwright attempted to flee the office. The door, however, happened to be obstructed by the Man in Black, who had been quietly observing the consecutive confrontations with an air of amusement.

"Your guys told me they were dead!" the shipwright couldn't help yelling at the Man in Black.

"You had all the info you needed! How could you screw up and still let them get away?"

The Fleet Admiral jumped to his feet. "What is he doing here, Catti? And why did you bring him in? Didn't I tell you lot I was not to be disturbed? I'm busy interrogating the prisoner, can't you see?"

"Are you sure, Stamper-sir? You seemed to be doing all of the talking from what I could hear," replied the marine officer snidely. "As for the other thing, you'll have to cut the interrogation short.

We've got new orders. The Pirate Queen's been sold."

found it unsettling how easily the Marine officer prattled off such morbid things.

"Of course I'm not entirely sure how you intend to communicate this to your master but I presume he takes that muzzle off when he wants to reward his errand dog or something," the marine officer added. She did seem to take an inordinate amount of pleasure in the humiliation of others.

Much too soon, they arrived at their destination. Mar took Red's advice to heart, and kept quiet and subdued as they were led into the impressive-looking building. Mar was of the opinion it looked more like a museum than an actual dwelling. It certainly seemed to have the an ostentatious number of security posts and personnel that would have been befitting of one.

They were met by the head servant, who snobbishly greeted them with: "Ah so the retrieving hound returns. You have the new addition with you, Red?"

Red mutely handed over a bundle of documents, which Mar presumed were her purchase papers.

"So this is the famed 'Pirate Queen'?" the head servant sniffed, looking her over. "Seems a bit overpriced. Can't imagine why the Masters are so very anxious to see her, but they've ordered that she be sent straight up to their room. They're leaving for St. Shulalia's soon, else the new girl would normally have to be made presentable first."

At the sound of St. Magda's voice, despite Red's warning, Mar gasped involuntarily and looked up.

"M—"

The response was immediate. A sharp blow to her face sent her reeling to the floor.

"Insolent slave!" thundered St. Magda. "How dare you lift your head to face your masters when we have not given you permission!"

"Insolent indeed!" said St. Magnus. "This trash needs to be taught a lesson, My Daughter. Or perhaps we should get her fixed. It did wonders for Red."

Mar quickly forgot about looking out for them when she heard her mother cry out a protest, and then St. Magnus' voice rising above the sounds of battle:

"Don't worry about the slave, Magda. I'll buy you a new one. Now come with me!"

St. Magnus was in a foul mood. His new elite bodyguard had run off with his newest acquisition, a rare baby boxfish mermaid. Such an outrage had never been perpetrated in all his years of hiring security personnel.

"Unacceptable!" the Tenryuubito roared at his unfortunate chief custodian. "Find that miserable worm Cree and bring what he stole back! Get an admiral on it if you must— if he gets away with this because of your negligence, I will feed you to the trigger-sharks myself!"

Sir,

A dangerous problem has recently surfaced with the first batch of successful test subjects.

A total of twelve so far have died post-procedure due to complications, but the point of concern is a previously unknown state the deceased enter post-mortem.

Out of the twelve who died, three exhibited this condition, and spontaneously reanimated after being certified as clinically dead.

They pulled up in front of what looked like a small restaurant (the man called it a 'bistro'). A middle-aged woman with graying hair was anxiously waiting for them. Well... the man, at least. "Thank goodness you're here! I'm so sorry to call you out at this hour but Shukree's gotten mugged, poor boy, and he had a full set of our keys in hand at that time and those bastards took them. Now I don't dare leave the shop! If they know where he worked they could walk in and steal everything any time they wanted!"