][Malice][ =One Piece=

:: Chapter Forty Two ::

[Okay, this was hard to write... I cried]

“What the hell happened?!” Kid was beyond furious. The screen had suddenly gone blank. Malice had been dead momentarily but the man torturing her had forced her back to life. “Get her back!” He barked at his crew furiously.

“Kid.” Killer called out calmly, their current allies were present. It was bad enough Kid acted like a madman while the crew tried to set up the monitor on the ship so he could keep an eye on Malice while they sailed out to rescue her. He was showing too much weakness in front of them too easily.

“Do you think she’s dead?” Titan asked with damp eyes.

“She’s not dead!” Kid roared causing all the metal work on the ship to rattle in his fury.

“Kid.” Killer tried again.

“SHE’S NOT DEAD!” Kid snarled turning on his first mate with hellish glowing feral ember eyes.

“Where’s the transponder snail located on this ship?” The ever calm blonde pirate captain of the Hawkins Pirates asked.

“In the kitchen, I think.” Spike replied as Kid continued glaring down his first mate.

“It may be in everyone’s best interest if you retrieve it.” Hawkins noted as he shuffled the cards he’d extracted from his deck back into the mix.

Spike hesitantly left the room.

“Kid, calm d-.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” Kid raged, sending a table flying at his first mate.

Killer easily swiped the table to the side causing it to splinter as it collided into the metal framework wall. “Kid-.”

“She can’t be dead.” Kid nearly buckled in defeat.

Titan furiously wiped tears from his eyes as Spike returned and set the transponder snail next to Hawkins.

Everyone was locked in silence for a long while. The captain and first mate still frozen in a standoff. Kid was finally on the verge of crumbling beneath his maddening grief. Killer, no matter the internal torment he was feeling for the girl they all loved, had to be the support to keep his captain going.

The transponder snail began to ring causing everyone to jump.

“It’s for you.” Hawkins indicated Kid.

Kid snatched up the receiver.

“Kid?” The familiar commanding voice of Red Hair Shanks rang throughout the room.

“Is that Red Hair?” Titan paled.

Heat elbowed him in the side and motioned for him to be silent.

“Red Hair.” Kid responded in a monotone. Was this the call swearing vengeance for his dead daughter, the call saying his days were numbered?

“What’s your current location?” Red Hair’s voice sounded oddly grave.

Killer prattled off their coordinates knowing Kid was too shell shocked.

“Head East. We’ll meet up.”

“Why?” Kid found his voice again, though it was shaky.

“She doesn’t have much time left. She’ll want to see you.” Red Hair’s voice cracked, “Head East.”

The line cut off abruptly.

“Head East.” Kid ordered softly before exiting the room heading to his private quarters. His body was trembling, and the moment he was out of sight from the others shook from deep racking sobs. He failed her.

The metal door of his quarters melded shut behind him as he stepped inside. He let out an agonized roar as he let his grief consume him. It was his fault she was dying, because he wasn’t strong enough to protect her. Because of his own weakness she felt the need to protect him, she’d always been protecting him, and now she was on her deathbed.

He dropped his head into his hands in defeat. It had nearly killed him when he’d thought he lost her before, but now that he knew that he was possibly going to be there when she took her final breath. Tears burned in his feral eyes.

“Malice.” He breathed her name as if in prayer. “I’m so sorry.”

The locket he’d begun to wear around his neck felt heavy with guilt. It would now be a constant reminder that he had killed her. It was his fault she’d ended up in Kaido’s hands. Because of the damage it had taken when Malice had once again protected him, it could never be opened. She’d never know the contents of the locket; she’d never be able to forgive herself.

In truth, the people in the locket had been an older couple, the boy’s parents. He had no siblings, no offspring. Kid had researched it on a whim. The parents of the boy had died only a few weeks before Malice had granted him mercy. She’d had no reason to feel guilty. He left nothing behind.

He balled his hands into fists and punched the mirror hanging over his desk causing it to shatter into thousands of miniscule fragments raining prisms of light throughout the room. “DAMN IT ALL!” Kid screamed and flipped his desk in rage scattering drawings and notes all over the room.

His gaze was drawn to a drawing he’d done when he’d first met Malice. It was how he’d always envisioned her, an elegant beauty. The scars didn’t matter, they would never matter, she would always be beautiful in his eyes. Tears threatened to fall again.

Kid roared in rage and threw his bed across the room causing the frame to snap and splinter and the feather mattress to explode. It wasn’t enough. He couldn’t destroy enough. Nothing could ever make it right. She was dying, and he was the only one to blame.

Perhaps after he saw her off to the afterlife, Red Hair would avenge her death and kill him. It would be what he deserved.