Chapter Text
It’s not an open secret, really.
It’s rather difficult for something to be a secret when no one is bothering to hide the evidence or even keep the information hushed up. It’s less that her job is meant to be private knowledge, and more that nobody ever talks about it. Sure, they know she’s there. Someone must be, right?
And someone is. The only Public Relations Officer that the Marines have, and the only one they’ve ever needed since she joined the force at seventeen.
They don’t talk about her, no, but she certainly talks about them. Every article praising the Marines, every cover-up concealing their dirty deeds, every shift of blame from the upstanding heroes of society onto the worthless scum of the sea. She’s been the driving force behind every last word, and the rumour is that if she were ever taken out, the Marines would crumble like a house of cards within days.
But of course, no one talks about that, because no one talks about her. They don’t need to. She does her job, and everyone else does theirs.
(She used to be someone else, once. She lived a different life back then, before the sea swallowed her whole and spat her back out with a new face, a new identity, a new life. All of these people, all of these problems – this whole world was fiction to her, once upon a time.
It can’t be fiction anymore.)
The benefit of being the only PR Officer that the Marines have is that everything goes to her. The downside is the exact same – everything goes to her. Everything from the biggest massacre to the smallest frown is sent straight to their one and only problem-solver, and it’s up to her to turn things around, twist a smile to a frown and a murder to a rescue. Shift the reasoning or shift the blame, and the whole narrative moves with it. It’s her favourite way to deal with problems nowadays.
She’s a studious worker, of course. All of her paperwork is submitted on time, and she keeps records of every change she’s ever made. Of all the files they’ve sent her, not a single one is out of order in her immense collection, and she’s made notes of each and every shift in the narrative. Every time she blamed the pirates for the Marines’ transgressions, she wrote it down and filed it accordingly. Every deescalation gone wrong, every escalation gone right, it’s all in her files, and the only person who knows that is her. It’s dangerous information, yes, but any information can be dangerous in the right hands – if one knows how to use it.
They don’t call her dangerous, because they rarely think of her at all. She’s nothing more than a tool at their disposal, loyal to a fault. After all this time and all these secrets, the Marines would never believe that she could do a single thing against them.
And that’s exactly what she can use against them.
She’s been planning this for years. Ever since she woke up on that shore, knowing that this life was not meant to be her own, in fact, even if it took a series of happy accidents and mild psychological manipulations to get her to this point.
It will all be worth it, though. That much, she’ll make sure of.
oOoOo
The execution of Fire-Fist Ace is nearly upon them.
Sengoku stares out at the crowds of Marines, heart heavy and face impassive. He knows somewhere in his soul that this isn’t right, but he thinks that the part of him that would argue has been dead for a long, long time. A young man will die today for the sins of his father.
It’s his duty to uphold the Gorosei’s orders. There is nothing Sengoku could say or do to convince them not to go through with this, and he’s known that all along. This execution will proceed as planned.
Somehow, it feels like he’s lost the will to care about that. The execution proceeds, Fire-Fist’s head will roll, and Sengoku will sigh and move on. That’s how it’s always gone, ever since he gained this prestigious role. It was an honour, they said, but sometimes, it feels more like a burden. Still, it is Sengoku’s burden to bear, and bear it he shall.
“Ace,” Sengoku asks. “What is the name of your father?”
The man chained at his feet scoffs. He refuses to meet Sengoku’s eyes. “My father is Shirohige.”
Sengoku knew he would say that.
“Untrue,” he responds, bringing the snail closer to his mouth. “The–”
But a quiet sound cuts him off. Footsteps, light but still noticeable, coming up the same stairs that Fire-Fist had just ascended. Sengoku turns just enough to see the top of the stairs out of the corner of his eye, and he nearly drops the den-den when he catches sight of the person who had made the sounds.
He knows her. Her face, at least, and her role, even if he doesn’t remember her name. He doesn’t think anyone has ever called her by it, anyways.
Sengoku watches warily as the Officer reaches the execution platform, arms occupied by a severe-looking file. She meets his nervous gaze with a serious one of her own, not even sparing a glance for Fire-Fist even as she walks right past him.
She never appears in public. Never.
But then… what is she doing here, and especially now? What could have possibly happened to necessitate the Marines’ highest ranking member, the Public Relations Officer, to not only show herself in public but to interrupt the execution of Gol D Ace?
“Sengoku-san. Pardon my interruption.” Her voice is measured, careful, just as he expects it to be. “I come with some rather pertinent information that must be released immediately.”
His eyes flick to the snail and back again. Sengoku can’t imagine what information she could possibly have, but then, he wouldn’t believe that Fire-Fist was the son of Gol D Roger without knowing the story for himself. There’s no telling what information she could be privy to that he may never lay eyes upon – after all, there’s a reason she’s the only PR Officer that the Marines have.
With a serious nod, Sengoku hands the snail over. “Ma’am.”
“Thank you.” She gives him a small bow of thanks before turning to address the crowd. “My fellow citizens of the world, it is time you know the truth. Portgas D Ace has been brought before you to be executed for the crime of existing. This world is ruled by the Marines, and thus, by the Marines’ definition of order. Fire-Fist is scorned by this world because of the circumstances of his birth, for he is the sole descendant of the Pirate King, Gold D Roger.”
Ah. Now Sengoku understands.
Perhaps he should have realised in advance that such a critical moment in the Marines’ order would require the essential touch of the PR Officer, and now that he’s reached the conclusion, he feels foolish for not noticing sooner.
But she isn’t done. “For twenty months, his mother, Portgas D Rouge, carried him in her womb in order to conceal his heritage, and for this crime, the people of Baterilla faced massacre. Any woman or any child with even the slightest chance of being related to the late Pirate King was slaughtered within moments, and the only saving grace that allowed Rouge and her unborn child to survive was her ability to hide. Portgas D Rouge died to bring her son into a world that scorned him, and countless women and children died alongside her for the crime of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Sengoku wouldn’t have said it quite so bluntly, but the crowds are still completely silent. He’ll just have to trust that the Officer knows what she’s doing, but isn't that the point of it all? She’s been doing this for years, and never once has she failed to spin the story she desires – the story that paints the Marines in the best light and gives the people the hope they need to feel safe with the Marines as their protectors.
The silence holds for a few long moments before she speaks again. Sengoku can practically feel the way Fire-Fist is seething, but for some reason, he hasn’t yet said a word.
“Baterilla is not the first of such massacres, and it wasn’t the last,” she says quietly, audibly only through the microphone of the snail. Her voice grows stronger as she continues. “Countless other islands suffered even greater losses than the Lost Generation of Baterilla in order to uphold the Marines’ ‘order’. The scholars of Ohara were slain for their pursuit of knowledge that the World Government deemed dangerous, for no other reason than its potential to unveil secrets that certain people would prefer to stay hidden. Reading a language was deemed a crime, and an eight year old girl was the only survivor, hunted for a truth she could not deny. She knew secrets that the World Government wished to eradicate, and that made her their target.
“The people of Flevance died for a lie while their royal family left unscathed. The Amber Lead Syndrome that afflicted the Flevans was never a disease, but a side effect of heavy metal poisoning caused by the white lead that their royals ordered them to mine, and the danger was kept secret from the very people it afflicted until it was too late to help. The city was set ablaze and any who sought to escape were shot down where they stood. Children were gathered together with the promise of leaving the city to seek help, and instead, they were murdered.”
“Ma’am,” Sengoku murmurs, and he can feel the way his voice sticks in his throat. “Ma’am, what are you doing?”
She turns, barely, just enough to meet his gaze with a steely look of her own. “Just as I said I would. I am telling the truth.”
“You will destroy the faith that the people have in the Marines,” he points out. His voice is as quiet as he can possibly make it without whispering, desperate to avoid being picked up by the den-den microphone. “The faith this institution needs in order to keep people safe–”
“If faith in the Marines can be so easily destroyed by telling simple truths, then let it be destroyed. Do you truly think I came here without knowing exactly what I was doing, Sengoku-san? Do you truly choose now of all times to doubt my loyalty and intelligence?”
“No, ma’am.”
She turns back to the crowds. “I ask you this, my fellow citizens. Did you have knowledge of the tragedies of which I spoke?”
A hushed murmur breaks out amongst the throngs, but it’s Shirohige himself who replies the loudest and clearest, eyes fixed firmly on the Officer’s small form up on the platform. .
“No. I knew of Baterilla and Ohara, but I had heard nothing of Flevance until you spoke of it.”
She nods. “Yes. That was by design. The less the public knew, the less they could contest, but that line of thinking has been… repealed. Altered, one might say. Secrecy and lies do not befit an honourable organisation, after all.”
(And somehow, when she says that, it feels like a threat.)
“Our system is flawed at its core.” Her voice rings out over the entirety of Marineford, cool and collected even as treasonous venom falls from her lips. “Hypocritical at best, and harmful at worst. The Warlords, the Pacifistas–”
“Pacifistas?” Fire-Fist interrupts, and it’s one of the first things he’s said during this entire ordeal, but before anyone gets the chance to say anything else, something spikes at the edges of Sengoku’s Observation Haki, and not even a second later, all hell breaks loose.
oOoOo
Ace doesn’t know what’s going on.
He expected… well, he sort of expected to die, but apparently that’s being revised. He expected his heritage to be revealed, and it was , but… not by Sengoku. No, some random woman had popped up out of nowhere, spoken to the Fleet Admiral like she had authority equal to his, if not higher , and promptly started spouting the wildest treason that Ace has ever heard in his life. If not for Sengoku’s lack of action against the lady, Ace would have assumed she was a Revolutionary plant or something.
She’s saying things he only half understands, about Ohara and Flevance, and now something about the Warlords and some other mystery by the name of–
“Pacifistas?” Ace says, and it’s not a second after he says it that the chaos begins as if a switch was flipped.
An enormous ship tumbles out of the sky with a bout of yelling to rival Ace’s crew in the middle of a party, and right on the deck of the ship is Luffy , looking a little worse for the wear but… alive .
And accompanied, by the looks of it. A small group of people clad mostly in prison uniforms are surrounding him on all sides, glaring at the crowds of Marines like a barrier (albeit some glaring far more spitefully than others). Luffy whips around, scanning the crowds until he spots what he’s looking for.
“AAAAAACE!” He yells, bolting for the platform the second he spots it. Ace jolts, rattling the chains around his wrists with the force of his worry as he watches his baby brother tear through throngs of Marines like ragdolls on a quest to reach him . Luffy is doing all of this… for Ace. It would’ve been so, so easy to leave Ace behind, and yet–
And yet here everyone is. His whole family, all together at Marineford for him .
The mysterious woman tuts, brow furrowing slightly as she watches Luffy’s path of destruction draw nearer and nearer. “Suppose I should have seen that coming.”
He doesn't know how she would have, but he also doesn't know how she knows so much top-secret information. Whoever this woman is, she’s dangerous, and he’s willing to bet real and semi-legal money that she knows far more than she’s letting on even now.
The woman glances in Sengoku’s direction, but he’s busy yelling for everyone to ‘stop Mugiwara’. A second later, she’s behind Ace, tucking the snail and the files into a messenger bag he hadn’t even noticed before now as she kneels down to inspect the manacles. The cuffs fall to the ground in moments and Ace whips around to give the woman an incredulous look.
“What’s your angle?” He asks suspiciously, inching backwards. “What are you playing at here?”
She raises an eyebrow. “You’re leaving this platform whether it’s by your actions or by mine. You don’t have time to argue about this right now.”
She’s… right. He doesn’t like it, but she’s got a point – right now, escape is the priority. Ace will just have to postpone the interrogation until after they’re out of the thick of things. Besides, he can’t just let Luffy rush into danger alone. He’s the older brother, after all; what good is that title if he doesn’t stop his baby brother from being stupid and reckless and getting himself killed as a result?
“Stop him! Do not let Mugiwara reach the execution platform!” Sengoku yells, whirling around to point at Ace – and by extension, at the mystery woman. “Execute Fire-Fist Ace, now! ”
“Oh, I think the fuck not ,” the woman mutters, rising to her full height and hauling Ace to his feet along with her. Now that they’re standing on equal ground, it's easy to see that she’s much shorter than him, and yet, her presence seems even stronger than his own with the way she’s staring at Sengoku. “Stand down.”
The Marines on either side of him drop their weapons on the ground in less than a second, hands raised and faces turned toward her for further instructions. Sengoku gives her an incredulous look.
“What are you doing , Officer?” He demands, and she raises a shockingly judgemental eyebrow.
“ I am doing exactly what I came here to do. You ought to refrain from meddling in things you don’t have the details to understand, Sengoku-san.”
The way she says it holds more weight than Ace thought possible, as if she’s pointing out a much bigger truth with only those simple words, and perhaps she is . It’s as if she’s reminding Sengoku of some difference between them – almost as though she’s implying she knows secrets that even the Fleet Admiral isn’t privy to.
That… couldn’t be true, could it? She’s been referring to Sengoku in such a respectful manner, calling him Sengoku-san and using such polite language, but… throughout what little Ace has been able to see of their interactions, it’s felt more like Sengoku was deferring to her .
And as if by magic, Sengoku does just that, stepping back as he regards the woman with an emotion that Ace can’t quite figure out. The mystery woman seems utterly unfazed by this completely insane turn of events, and instead turns on her heel and stalks off the execution platform, grabbing Ace by the wrist and dragging him along with her. As she descends the steps into the crowd, the Marines back away from her, opening up a path in the throngs of people.
The woman points straight ahead to where Luffy is still fighting, and– oh, fuck , there’s a Warlord involved now. Multiple Warlords. Ace’s gaze flicks from his brother to the woman and back again, and he would be ready to demand that she do something about it if he weren’t wary of her response.
“That’s your problem,” she says bluntly, letting go of his wrist. “And when you’re done handling that, you’re going straight to Shirohige, or else you’re going to regret it . Do you understand me?”
Ace furrows his brows in confusion, unsure of what he’s being asked. “What?”
“Get your idiot out of the situation he got himself into, take him to your father, and leave. Preferably as soon as possible. Now, do you understand? ”
He nods, shaky and confused, but it’s enough for her. She’s gone in an instant, vanished into the sea of Marines, and Ace is left with no choice but to rush towards Luffy as fast as possible, hoping against hope that he won’t be too late to save the best thing that ever happened to him.
oOoOo
Crocodile is an opportunist.
He’ll work for what he wants, of course, but he’s never one to turn down a chance to gain an advantage, no matter how small. It’s how he ended up in the Warlords, it’s how he ended up with Nico Robin as his second-in-command, and now, it’s how he’s ended up going straight from the frying pan to the fire.
Retrospectively, it should have been obvious that Mugiwara would sow chaos wherever he went, but Crocodile had been hoping to at least get far enough away to avoid the brunt of it before anything too bad kicked off. And yet, here he was, right in the middle of Marineford and facing off with some of the strongest people still alive from the Golden Age of Piracy. Just his luck.
But it appears that Mugiwara isn’t the only one who decided to shake things up today. Crocodile had been prepared to intervene, had the executioners truly attempted to end Fire-Fist Ace’s life, if only because he didn’t want to deal with the emotional repercussions that Mugiwara would surely make everyone’s problem, but it looks as though there was no need. A woman he doesn’t recognise seems to be right in the thick of things, crowds parting before her like fissures from an earthquake as she all but drags Fire-Fist Ace down from the execution platform and points him sternly in Mugiwara’s direction.
Crocodile keeps his eyes on her as she weaves through the throngs of people, darting into one of the small doors built into the walls of Marineford. He loses sight of her as the door slams shut, and his eyes narrow.
“Now, that’s going to be interesting,” he murmurs to himself, bringing a hand up to his chin. Beside him, Mr. 3 shoots him an odd look, but Crocodile pays him no mind, instead taking to the sky as a cloud of sand. No use in explaining his thought process to those whom he doubts will understand, not when it’s much easier to simply pursue his curiosities directly.
Whirling across Marineford over the heads of the enemy officers, he touches down right in front of the door, only turning human enough to yank it open before he allows his flesh to dissolve into thousands of tiny granules of sand once more. As he moves up the stairs, following what must have been the path of the mysterious woman from before, the sounds of static start to fill his ears as the broadcast across Marineford changes.
Where it was previously the shouted orders of Sengoku to murder that idiotic child, it’s now changed to a female’s voice, measured and firm. It must be the woman he’s following. Of that, he feels no doubt.
“This war is not a war meant to be won,” the disembodied voice states, staticky and crackling through the filter of the loudspeakers. “It’s nothing more than a game of chess that will end in a massacre.”
Crocodile slams open the only door he finds at the end of the staircase, and there she is. Plain, unassuming, dressed just like any other officer in the typical Marine button-up and hat, paired with a long pleated skirt in standard-issue blue. If he hadn’t seen her up there on the execution platform, if he hadn’t known exactly where to go to find her, he would have never been able to pick her out of the crowds.
“You seem to know an awful lot of secrets about an awful lot of things,” he notes, knowing full well that his voice is loud enough to be picked up by the den-den’s microphone. “Why is that?”
The two stare at each other for a long, tense moment, neither willing to fold or give any ground to the other, before the woman tilts her head back slightly, tipping her chin at him in a gesture that would be condescending if not for the fire in her eyes.
“I am the Public Relations Officer,” she says, quietly but with power behind the words all the same. “I am the one that the Marines call when they’ve irrevocably fucked things up, because I am the one who covers up every single one of their messes. You want to know why I know all of these things? Because I was the one tasked with twisting them around so much that the original deed becomes unrecognisable in the face of the cover story.”
Crocodile pauses, and the woman turns back to the open window, watching the battlefield as she continues to speak.
“You are a perfect example of that, Sir Crocodile. You sought to take over a kingdom backed by the World Government, and the Marines did nothing to stop you. You were allowed nearly every permission, all because you had agreed to a position as a Warlord . Your attempted takeover of Alabasta was thwarted, yes, but not by Marines. The credit was taken from a group of pirates and dropped onto the only squadron of Marines that happened to be there by coincidence – Captain Smoker, formerly stationed in Loguetown. He and his officers assisted, yes, but it was Mugiwara no Luffy and his crew who truly won that fight. I imagine Captain Smoker is still rather disgruntled at the shift of credit that he feels is undue.”
Crocodile knows all of this already, but she isn’t telling him . She’s talking to the crowds – the people on both sides who are slowing their fighting, eyeing each other like they’re just now realising that they may not be on the side that they thought they were. She’s sowing chaos and dissent amongst the fighters, yes, but why? It only undermines the organisation that he assumes is the one she works for. What does she gain from this?
“Sir Crocodile is not the only such example,” the woman continues. “The Heavenly Demon, Doflamingo, has taken over the kingdom of Dressrosa in a similar manner. He deposed the king, forced the remaining members of the royal family to join him, become gladiators in a twisted tournament, or die, including the youngest, who is barely fourteen, and he’s been able to do all of this due to the fact that he’s backed by the World Government as a result of his shady dealings and involvement in the Marines’ experiments and scientific research.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Crocodile can see Sengoku’s tiny form out of the window, staring up at the woman with incredulity as she doesn’t falter for even a second. Crocodile himself doesn’t dare take his gaze off of her. Doflamingo, on the other hand, seems to be regarding the woman with curiosity and another emotion that Crocodile can’t quite place – something dark.
“Experiments and scientific research,” Crocodile repeats suspiciously. “And what exactly does that entail?”
He’s not sure if he’s stalling for time or something else, but whatever it is, he barely expects it to work. This isn’t the kind of person that can be escaped from. And yet, all she does is glance at him before opening her mouth to respond. Luckily, or perhaps very unluckily , the situation outside interrupts her before she can speak, a distraction that manifests itself as a plume of smoke rising from the midst of the Marine crowds that catches the woman’s attention immediately.
“You wanted to know about the experiments?” She asks, but it’s clearly rhetorical as she responds to herself a moment later. “There’s your answer.”
oOoOo
Pacifistas. One of the government’s latest attempts to break all moral codes in the name of power and false justice.
She expected these to show up here.
(She’d seen it, after all, a lifetime ago, flashing by on a screen as she watched with bated breath to see what would happen. Who would win.)
Not everything about Marineford is exactly as she expected it to be – certain words are added and left out, certain people choose different paths, but that’s the result of her meddling, and she knows it. What matters is that the general timeline is the same, or at least close enough that she can extrapolate and plan for any divergences from the original path.
Sir Crocodile is watching the Pacifistas with a calculating expression, and she can’t tell if he’s thinking of how to defeat one, or if he’s planning to try and use it against the Marines. She couldn’t fault him either way, but she’d like to have the Pacifistas mostly intact for the next phase of her plan.
“These automatons were modelled after Bartholomew Kuma, who was last seen at Sabaody before the disappearance of the Mugiwara Pirates.” She speaks the words clearly and concisely into the den-den, eyes fixed on the chaos of the battle before her. It may not be affecting her right now, but she needs to keep track of everything in this battle, lest something go wrong. “They also take techniques from Kizaru and translate them into machinery, allowing them to shoot lasers at any target they’re turned towards.On top of that, they are very, very difficult to destroy.”
As she speaks, she watches the robots engage with the mass of pirates beneath the tower, turning their sights on the nearest victims. She watches the pirates scramble to get out of the way, skin burned by the edges of the lasers shooting towards the spot where many of them had just been standing. She can already see the scorch mark forming as the binding light of the laser dies down.
Across the battlefield, she can just make out the form of one Portgas D Ace making his way towards the cluster of Shirohige Pirates, his younger brother trailing on his heels. Good. If they can make it off of this battlefield, then the entire fight will be–
“PACIFISTAS!”
Her head snaps up from where she was observing the fighters, gaze falling instead upon the Fleet Admiral as he glares down the fleeing siblings. This will not be good.
“YOUR NEW TARGETS… ARE PORTGAS D ACE AND MONKEY D LUFFY! THE SON OF THE PIRATE KING AND THE SON OF THE REVOLUTIONARY DRAGON!” Sengoku jabs a finger at the pair, voice loud and booming enough to carry all the way across the battlefield even without the use of the den-den mushi she’d commandeered.
Well, fuck.
She turns around to face Sir Crocodile, who up until this point had fallen suspiciously silent. Luckily, he’s still here, even if he’s developed a rather peculiar expression. Setting down the den-den, she looks him in the eyes and makes her proposition. “I can’t get to the other side of the battlefield quickly enough on my own.”
He raises an eyebrow, odd expression mostly dissipating as he regards her with mild disdain. “And why should I care about that?”
“You came here to escape Impel Down. You may not have any stake in the lives of Mugiwara or Fire-Fist, but you value your freedom like any true pirate. If you can get me across this battlefield unharmed, I can ensure that you escape this disaster with your life and your freedom still intact.”
Crocodile smirks. “Very well. For a Marine, you cut quite an interesting deal.”
She says nothing, merely raising an expectant eyebrow until he dissolves into a cloud of sand, sweeping her up off of the floor and whirling out the open window, making a beeline for the aforementioned brothers. The sand is gritty and abrasive, but she pays it no mind, keeping her eyes fixed on the target until Crocodile drops her unceremoniously beside them, the man himself touching down gracefully and tilting his head back, as if to say, ‘what now?’ .
The Pacifistas are almost upon them, but it’s of no consequence. Stepping forward and placing herself between the exhausted-looking Fire-Fist and Mugiwara, who don’t look like they could run another metre at this point, she looks the head Pacifista square in its mechanical eyes and opens her mouth to speak.
“Disregard your previous orders. Your target is inconsequential.”
The Pacifistas slow to a stop, standing awkwardly in front of her. Behind her, she can practically feel the two younger boys gaping as Sir Crocodile huffs in… amusement, perhaps, though it could be annoyance.
But up on the platform, the Fleet Admiral has frozen in his tracks, staring at her with an unmitigated shock.
“How did you do that?” He demands, leaping down from the execution platform and stalking towards her. “How have you gained command over the Pacifistas?”
Ah. Now that’s an answer she’s perfectly willing to give. She gives the Fleet Admiral a small, self-satisfied smile as she begins to explain. “The Pacifistas, of course, follow the chain of command. To halt an order, you must be of equal or higher rank than the one who gave the order. And due to a rather exploitable technicality… the one on this battlefield with the highest rank is not you. It’s me .”
Sengoku doesn’t even respond.
“In order to access any of the Marine records, one needs to have an applicable rank, and as the PR Officer of the entire organisation, I need to be able to access everything . Therefore, I would need a technical promotion bringing me to a rank higher than the highest one previously available – that of the Fleet Admiral. And since those of a higher rank may give orders to their juniors… despite the fact that I have no units serving under me, I am technically capable of giving orders to any Marine on this battlefield.”
She’s known this the whole time.
The only thing that’s changed now is that she’s got an audience to tell it to. It’s no use exposing every single government secret she’s amassed during her career if there’s no one of any consequence to hear it. Today, however, the broadcast has been rolling the entire time, and it’s been going out to the entire world.
Today, they’re all finally going to hear what she has to say, and she won’t be leaving out a single detail.
“No,” Sengoku murmurs, looking baffled. “That isn’t possible. The only ones above me in the chain of command are…”
“The Gorosei,” she finishes cheerfully. “Who do you think allowed me this rank, Sengoku-san?”
“And do you simply intend to let these criminals walk free?”
Ah, that’s a new voice. She’s heard it before, of course, but it’s always an unpleasant shock no matter how much she’s expecting it (or not, in some cases).
Kizaru strolls up behind Sengoku to flank him, eyes trained on the two pirates behind her. She doesn’t dare glance in their direction. “Officer. You claim you have the highest rank here, and yet you intend to allow a pair of criminals to go free? They must be served justice, right here and right now.”
“Stand down, Kizaru-san.” She frowns. “You have no authority over me, and you would do well to remember that fact.”
“You’re going to be stripped of your rank for this,” Kizaru notes, raising an eyebrow as he regards her with something unidentifiable. Disdain, or perhaps pity. “Everything you’ve worked for, gone, all because you decided to betray over a pair of pirates.”
“Perhaps. But you’ll just have to wait and see if that’s truly what’s happening here, now won’t you? After all, do you really think the Gorosei would have allowed me to come here and say all of this if they were opposed to it?”
“They may not have allowed you–”
“Really? You doubt their knowledge?” She raises an eyebrow. “You disappoint me, Kizaru. We’re done here.”
And with that, she turns on her heel and walks away, flicking her head for Fire-Fist and Mugiwara to follow her, leaving Sengoku and Kizaru to watch.
The crowds part before her, just as before, the Marines unwilling to attack the superior of their Fleet Admiral and the pirates unwilling to risk harming Portgas D Ace – or, alternately, unwilling to risk provoking her into harming Portgas D Ace. She wouldn't, but they don’t know that, and so their wariness is understandable. Making a beeline through the sea of people, she continues walking until she reaches the man she was heading towards in the first place.
Shirohige.
He’s facing off against Akainu, but they seem to be at a temporary standstill, each regarding the other with wary suspicion as their gazes flick from each other to her and back again. Stopping a few metres away from him so she won’t be forced to crane her neck in order to meet his eyes, she looks up and speaks.
“Shirohige-san. Please pardon my intrusion.”
“Consider it pardoned,” he says easily, still keeping his eyes on his opponent. “I see you’ve brought my son to me.”
“I have.”
“You are committing an act of betrayal by doing so,” Akainu interrupts with a scowl. “Careful how you proceed, Officer, or you may find yourself on the receiving end of Absolute Justice.”
She arches her eyebrow, thoroughly unimpressed. “I doubt that. Stand down, Akainu. There will be no quarrel with this man today.”
“Haah?” A trail of irritated smoke curls up from the corner of his mouth as his scowl deepens. She can see the twitch in his fingers, the desire to curl that hand into a fist and put it straight through Fire-Fist’s sternum, but she won’t allow that to happen. Not while she can still do something about it.
“You heard me,” she repeats, more sternly this time. “Stand. Down. You will no longer attack Shirohige or his men today. We are at an impasse.”
“And why is that? What gives you the authority to make that decision, Officer?”
“For one, the Gorosei’s bestowment of my rank,” she begins, cocking her head as if to challenge him to refute her. “But look around you, Akainu. The battlefield is already littered with fallen soldiers of both sides. We need not shed any more blood over a battle that none of us would emerge victorious from. Even if we win, we will still have lost far too many lives to justify it. This must stop now, before we pay a cost we will regret even further.”
Akainu grits his teeth. “ Tch. And you seek to order me to… stand down? ”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I do . As your superior, I order it. Stand down, or you will regret it.”
And like the embers of a dying fire, Akainu’s magma cools, settling back into his skin and showing his compliance with her orders. With that handled, she turns to Shirohige.
“I wish to request safe passage aboard your ship, Shirohige-san,” she says firmly. “And in return, I bring you your son, alive and with his head still attached to his shoulders.”
Shirohige frowns. “And what business do you have aboard my ship? You have brought me my beloved son, for which I am grateful, but I’m afraid I cannot yet trust you to stay neutral on the same ship as my children.”
“My business is my own, but you have my word that I shall bring no harm to any of your children. I swear it on my life.” She folds her hands in front of her and bows low, exposing the back of her neck. A risky move with most other opponents, but she trusts a man as honourable as Shirohige not to take advantage of the opportunity and decapitate her.
“Hm. Very well. As you have returned Portgas D Ace to us, I shall allow you to accompany him back to the Moby Dick.”
She smiles in satisfaction to herself before schooling her face back into a more respectful expression and rising from the bow. “Thank you. Your actions are greatly appreciated.”
And as she walks towards the Moby Dick, Fire-Fist and Mugiwara following behind her, Akainu does not follow. He may believe in that ‘Absolute Justice’ nonsense, but even the most abrasive Admiral must bend to the commands of his betters, or else he’ll be replaced by someone who will.
The Marines may not know her plan, nor the pirates, but she does. She’s got years and years’ worth of dirt on the Marines, hidden away someplace no one will ever find it… unless they know where to look, that is. Now, all she needs is to get ahold of a den-den or send a message to News Morgan, and she’ll have finally succeeded in her quest. The Marines will be exposed for every terrible thing they’ve done, every crime they’ve committed and every sentient right they’ve violated, and she’ll get to sit and watch them burn.
And who knows? Perhaps for her next endeavour, she’ll set her sights even higher. There’s always a bigger fish, after all, especially on a largely oceanic planet. The Marines may be a significant obstacle, but they’re still not quite the largest.
This world is long overdue for a reset, anyways. If no one else will do it, then she might as well.