Cross my Heart | a Buggy fan fiction

s I x

Deep within the dark depths of his brittle heart, he had once harbored the naive need to feel wanted and even.....loved. But now he was a fully grown man fast approaching his mid-thirties and had come to accept that no one could ever truly want a freak like him. So he'd constructed a wall around his heart. An impenetrable fortress built with the intention of keeping all others out.

It was undeniable there had been that weird, deep-staring thing with Amby the previous night. But that was nothing. Clown or no clown, he was still a red-blooded male who had enjoyed the company of women over the years, so he was not immune to his baser instincts; such as lust. But....he recognized the stirring of the blood when he experienced lust - which in truth had become less and less frequent during the past few years - but what he had felt with Amby had not been anything nearly as simple as that. No. If he didn't know better, he might've even suspected that unexpected tension when their eyes had locked could've been considered them sharing a "moment" something of which was a complete novelty and mystery to him. A type of shared connection that resembled a faint longing, and it had tried to poke and prod at the place in his heart where he no longer permitted feelings to go.

Of course he had quickly killed the moment. Whatever potential feelings he may have sensed developing, he had shut down, locked up and buried them deep inside. Hell, he would've buried them in a box and thrown them into the bottom of the fucking ocean if possible.

He was no doubt just being ridiculous anyway, letting his all-too-wild imagination run away with itself. She was his map and nothing more. His ticket to finding that little fuckhead, and his merry band of fuck-wits. Not to mention, he wanted to find the One Piece!
But on the other hand, the more he thought about it, Amby had professed to being a fan of his too, which naturally had stroked his somewhat fragile ego. So that was a bonus. But in spite of all the bravado, he was still struggling to fully come to terms with actually having a real fan. One that claimed to want to serve him, no less. Had he been younger and more of a degenerate he might've taken full advantage of the situation, but no.....he knew she would never want him like that. Besides, he was also less inclined to let his libido rule his head these days.

As he stood up on the top deck with Alvida, charting their course towards the grand line, much to his consternation he found his concentration repeatedly wavering as his gaze scanned the lower deck at regular intervals.

Damn it.

He had been eagerly anticipating this voyage for so long. Finally, after so many wasted years and failed attempts, he was on course to the grand line! To fulfill his destiny. And to seek revenge on that rubber-prick straw hat pirate kid, he should've been fully focused on the journey that lay ahead. So why was he so damn distracted?!

Naturally he argued back-and-fourth in his head. Overthinking and trying to psychoanalyze himself. It was necessary to keep a close eye on his best asset, he attempted to reason with himself. Amby was his best shot out of here, his literal map to the grand line. So of course it was only natural that he was reluctant to let her out of his sight, especially when she was mingling with the other riff-raff of Alvida's crew.

Yes. That's all it was, he was convinced of that.

After finally having mastered the tying of various knots, the young woman had pouted when he'd then suggested she work on her sewing skills. He didn't explain to her that was how he had began his career on board a ship. Instead he'd poked fun at her for sulking, and ordered her to get on with it. Mostly, it was just to keep her safe in his absence, as to his annoyance he'd then been called by Alvida to assist with navigating. So, Buggy had begrudgingly left Amby in the charge of Poppoko; Heppoko's younger brother, but the clown pirate was quietly confident that the witless oaf wouldn't mess with her, not when he knew she was strictly off limits.