Blueno slams the door to Iceburg's mansion shut behind him, and is more than mad about the wind girl interfering with their mission.
Kaku left the room to get his cuts from his fight patched up, while Robin drops the gun on the table, and sits down on a vacant chair.
The archaeologist couldn't believe her rotten luck. Her deal could've gone perfectly if Rose didn't interfere. With her showing up, there's no doubt that she knows their future. They could use this info to change the deal to keep Rose as a prisoner. They might not even let her live if they catch her now! After so much time of keeping her information to herself, she couldn't have waited another day?!
Even though she's trying to collect her thoughts, Blueno wastes no time in approaching his prisoner from across the table. "Explain yourself."
Robin stops her train of thought, puts on a cold mask to protect her innocence, and gives him a scowl of her own. "You think I wanted her to show up? I'm more upset about this than you are. She ruined everything like usual."
"Are you telling me that you had no idea that she knew about this?"
"As I said before, throughout our time together, she was oblivious to everything. She would always stay in the background. This is the first time I've seen her openly interfere."
"Oh really?"
Both Robin and Blueno pause at Rufus' voice, and look to see both him, Lucci, and Andreos entering the room. While Rufus is holding a pleasant grin, Andreos holds a neutral face as he stands to the side.
"What's going on?" Blueno asks when he looks at the other agents, then to his leader who looks like he's ready to kill at any moment.
Lucci moves away from the agents, and to an empty chair before he practically snarls out the news. "Because the outsider interfered with our last mission, both CP 8 and CP 9's goals are now combining. We will go after Iceburg again tonight, with CP 8 alongside us."
Robin doesn't like the idea of these new teammates, but she holds her tongue to keep herself from experiencing any further pain.
Rufus looks more than amused by her look of defiance, and approaches the table. "So, in the name of our new friendship. Tell me more about what you knew of her."
Robin's frown deepens by the request, but knows that if any of the Straw Hats are going to survive, she needs to give them something. "When I first met her, I thought of her as nothing but a simple child, just like our captain. As we journeyed together, she mostly kept to herself. She'd go off on her own almost every time we'd visit an island. Whenever she did, it was either for street performing or her own secret mission that somehow affected our adventures. Looking back on it, we all should've seen something off about her."
"And you're telling me that no one in the crew knows of her origins or her research?"
"We all know of her research, as for who knows the truth, I believe I'm the only one who knows. No one would accept monsters like us after all. The only way for anyone to accept us would be for us to hide who we are."
"Well said." Rufus smirks at the hopeless comment she gave, then looks to Lucci. "My team will meet you back here tonight at eight. Any problems with that?"
"Not at all, the sooner we get through this the better." Lucci answers without looking at him.
The explosion man takes that as his queue to check the status of the rest of his team, and takes his leave with Andreos beside him.
Once the two reach the infirmary, they see both Lareos and Nishiki sitting up in their beds. Both of Nishiki's forearms are wrapped in white bandages, from when Rose sliced at them while he looks slightly battered from the beatdown.
Lareos doesn't look any better himself. Not only did he have his ears bandaged from Zira's sound attack, but both his right wrist and left ankle are bandaged up from the burns he had to endure when Rufus blew up the cuffs that Rose trapped him in.
Lareos is the first to notice his comrades' arrival, and wears a bright smile while he raises his right hand as a greeting. "HEY GUYS, WHAT'S NEW?!"
All three agents cringe from the loud tone, but Lareos couldn't help it since the bandages were covering his ears.
While Rufus and Andreos cover their ears immediately, Nishiki took some effort to raise his hands up because of Rose's attack.
More than frustrated by his injuries, Nishiki uses his leg to kick Lareos' head. "KEEP YOUR VOICE DOWN!"
Lareos yells in pain as he holds his aching head, then goes to punch him, but Andreos acted quickly by ripping off the bandages from Lareos' head!
Lareos yells at the painful pull before he grips his head. "Agh, what the fuck Andreos?!"
"We don't have time for your nonsense! Cp 9 lost Wind Rider last night!"
Both agents freeze at the mention of their target, and go from bickering, to paying full attention to him. "What's the plan?"
Rufus can't help but snicker at their change in attitude, because when they're like this, they act like proper agents, so he knows they mean business. "It's simple, we join the cat's unit on their second attempt at the mayor. While they're busy getting their mission done on the inside, we stir up trouble outside of the mansion. From what I heard, Galley-La will be guarding him, so we slaughter as many as we can to draw out Wind Rider, and take her down."
Both injured men smirk at the plan, but Andreos looks over to NIshiki's arms. He knows that the ninja's arms haven't fully healed, and to prove it, he grabs an apple from a nearby table. "Nishiki, catch."
He tosses the fruit to him without further warning, and while Nishiki did move his arms to catch it, just before his face, he didn't throw it back at the offender like he normally would've.
The other agents were quick to notice this, so Rufus speaks up. "I see, Lareos' injuries can be dealt with, but your weakened state could cause trouble."
Nishiki widens his eyes at this and jumps out of bed. "I can't be on standby here! I don't care if I'm reduced to being the bait! That bitch needs to pay for what she did to me!"
The explosive man smirks at his comrade's lust for vengeance before he nods. "Alright, as you said, you'll be used as bait. Your state might not be a good match for the demon, but you should be fine against a bunch of carpenters. Your mission is to attract a large enough bloodbath to draw her out, and then the three of us will take her down."
"Hell yea!" Nishiki and Lareos jump in joy and practically start cheering much to Andreos' annoyance.
Andreos looks to his injured comrades, then to his superior, who seems to enjoy watching the others be so excited. Honestly, he hates when they get like this, because they look like wild animals getting stoked for a hunt. Sadly, he needs to deal with them for another item. "I'm glad you're excited, but there's still the issue about Dr. Vegapunk's test subject. Even with the bird's aura also being strange, it's not as strong as Wind Rider's. She'll be harder to track in this city."
The agents settle down at the reminder of the falcon on the loose, because Rufus and Nishiki forgot about her.
Lareos though, could never forget the fact that he lost to a fucking bird! His thirst for revenge is almost as strong as Nishiki's bloodlust against her. Still, something piqued his interest when he remembered the encounter, and puts on a smirk. "I don't think we need to worry too much. Wind Rider freed her, and escaped before Nishiki and I got in. When I started beating on Wind Rider though, she came back and attacked me. After we capture Wind Rider, I have a feeling that the bird will follow to try to save her."
"And if not, who cares?! It's the damn doctor's fault that the parrot escaped!" Nishiki comments, as he sits back on the bed.
For once, Rufus has to agree with the ninja the demon comes first, or else she could get away. They don't have time to go bird hunting for a quack doctor. He looks to his right hand for the mission and voices his thoughts. "We need to bring the demon to Sengoku at all costs. I'm sure he values her more than the bird, even if it's also an outsider. After we bring her to Marineford, we can hunt for the bird."
Andreos isn't all too happy at the answer, but given the options, he doesn't see another option. "Very well, we'll keep our focus on Wind Rider then."
As if on cue, Nishiki and Lareos practically cheer at the thought of beating her down, with Rufus holding a sinister smirk at the chance. Andreos quietly sighs at their bloodlust before he takes his leave. If he's going to both fight a demon, and keep his comrades from doing something stupid, he's going to need all the training he can get before the mission.
**************************************************
When dawn's light began to shine on the city, the straw hat pirates were quick to get up for the day.
Nami is getting herself ready for the day, with Sanji leaving to see if Rose or Robin returned to the ship.
However, Zoro knows that Sanji at least won't find Rose there, because he was on the rooftop when Rose took Luffy away to cheer him up. The swordsman may be glad to know that his sparring partner's ok, but with Robin not returning with her, he knows that there's more chaos coming.
Since Rose and Luffy left, he was watching out for when they'd return, so he can talk to the wind girl, but so far only Chopper came up to give him some company.
The reindeer sees Zoro, but looks around to see that he's the only one there. "Have you seen Luffy? He's not in his room."
"Rose came by and took him out for a flight." The swordsman casually answers to the reindeer's surprise.
"She came back?! Where'd she go?!"
"How should I know?" Zoro asks when he looks around then stops when he sees Sanji jumping from roof towards them until he lands on the roof. "What were you doing, ero cook?"
Sanji huffs at the insult, but he's not in the mood to get into a fight with him today, so he just answers. "I went by the Merry to see if Robin-chan or Rose-chan went there, but no luck..."
Zoro softens at the answer until he feels a light breeze at a strangely cool temperature that suddenly turned warm. He follows the direction of the wind to see that both the wind girl and captain are coming back. "Found Rose."
"Ha, ha, very funny moss-!" Sanji stops his insult when he, and Chopper, follow his gaze to see his crew mates returning.
Sanji is surprised by her return, but Chopper is quick to brighten up when they land in front of them. "Rose, you're back!"
The reindeer rushes up to her, and hugs her legs in relief.
The wind girl chuckles at the affection before she releases Luffy's hand and kneels down to return the hug. "Sorry to worry you doc."
"Where were you? What happened to Robin?" Zoro asks which pulls Rose back to the reality of her situation.
She releases the hug, and stands up. "We got separated yesterday when I was fighting some assholes. I looked for her after I escaped, but-!"
The door to the hotel slams open which stops Rose from continuing and draws their attention to Nami rushing outside with a newspaper in her hand. "GUYS, ICEBURG WAS ATTACKED LAST NIGHT!"
"WHAT?!" Luffy asks when he rushes to the paper with Sanji and Chopper joining in.
Both Rose and Zoro stay out of the circle but intently listen to Nami citing the highlights of the story. "Some servants heard a struggle from Iceburg's room, and went to check. When they got there, they found Iceburg in the hallway unconscious and with a gun wound in his arm. They treated his wounds, but he hasn't woken up yet."
Rose had to take a few breaths from her nose to keep her mood breeze from going off, and while the ones crowding the paper don't notice, the swordsman can see his friend's anxiety as clear as day. He knows that she was involved, but doesn't say anything yet.
"I'm gonna go see what happened." Luffy turns to leave, but Sanji stops him.
"Wait Luffy, we should eat first. I think it's gonna be a long day."
The captain hesitates to this, but knowing that Iceburg's injuries aren't life threatening he lets himself take a short break by heading inside. "Alright, afterwards I'm gonna see him."
"I'll go as well." Rose speaks up for him to hear, but stays to watch him go in.
"I'll go with you guys too." Nami says before she follows him inside.
Sanji quietly sighs as he goes to serve the meals he prepared before he left for the ship. "In that case, I'll look for Robin after the meal."
"I wanna go with you too!" Chopper chirps with the chef nodding before he goes in. Before the doctor follows him, he looks to Rose. "Come with me, I want to see that eye of yours."
The wind girl nods and goes to follow him, but Zoro grabs the back collar of her shirt to stop her. "Go on without us Chopper, I need to bring her up to speed about the ship."
The reindeer slightly saddens from the reminder of Merry's fate, and slowly nods before he goes inside.
Rose's face softens at Chopper's sadness, but knows that she has other problems. Like possibly losing the only friend that accepted her secret. After all, she managed to get both the sniper and archaeologist to lash out at her, for telling them what she knows, in just one day. Hard to doubt that it won't happen again with that kind of track record...
With one last calming breath, she looks up to her friend with an apologetic look. "I did know about Merry. I tried stopping it by getting the monkeys to reinforce the keel before we went to Skypiea, but the knock up stream was just too much for her. I'm sorry..."
Zoro slightly softens at the apology, and gives her an exasperated huff before he lets go of the shirt. "That's the least of my problems. What really happened when you and Robin went out?"
"Like I said, we got separated. Some World Government assholes chased after us. They caught me for a while, but I managed to escape."
"And Robin?"
Rose's frown deepens by the question, but he deserves to know. "They caught up to her too. She joined their ranks, but not by choice. I tried to get her out of there, but she refused. She thinks of herself as a curse, and those bastards are using that against her to make her sacrifice herself for the crew's safety. If we have any chance of getting her back, then Luffy needs to talk some sense into her."
Zoro scowls at the answer and has an idea of when she tried to rescue her. "Let me guess. You tried when she was attacking Iceburg?"
Rose widens her eyes at the question. "How the fuck did you know?"
"Your face said it all when Nami was talking about it. You should've told us, so we could've gotten to her."
She softly sighs by the comment, but it's all too true. "You guys had too much to deal with from Usopp's duel. At the very least, I managed to stop Iceburg from getting more injuries than what I saw happening. I know that she'll be back there tonight anyway, so we can have our chance then. We just need to survive today."
He accepts that answer, and doesn't ask her about what'll happen, because he'd rather not add more to his growing headache. Instead, he asks another question that's been bothering him since he learned that she knew about their past and future. "Is knowing all this stuff, really worth this burden you have?"
The outsider is surprised by him asking that kind of question, because she was sure he'd ask about today.
To be honest, that solemn question has made her wonder about that more times than she could count. She always came to the same conclusion though.
She takes a small breath and looks up at her friend to give him her answer. "If I can use it to help you guys, then it holds the same worth as the One Piece for me. Otherwise, there'd be no point in knowing all this stuff."
She lifts her lips in a small grin to ease the tension, and gives him a shrug. "Whether or not it'll hold up to its worth today, I'm afraid we can't see it until tonight. Before I head in, is there anything else you want to know?"
The swordsman hesitates for a moment, but shakes his head. "Like you said, we'll have to wait for tonight. Just don't do something stupid like getting caught again."
Rose twitches an eyebrow at that before she bites back another insult at him. "There's less chance of that happening than you not getting lost, you cactus brain!"
"What was that airhead?!"
"You heard me, you mossy dingus!"
The two friends continue on their battle of insults all the way inside, and down two stories. They even continued insulting each other when Chopper grabs Rose's jacket to drag her away from the fight to examine her injuries and Nami dragged Zoro away to eat.
******************************************
After Chopper placed a medicinal patch on Rose's right eye, he looks at the bandage on Rose's right hand. "What kind of a fight did you go through yesterday?"
"Just an everyday fight as a pirate, right?" Rose asks when she removes the bandage, and is surprised to see the stitching that she got from the doctor Lily's dad brought her to.
Chopper is even more surprised by the nice treatment, and takes a closer look to see that he doesn't need to do anything with it. "Wow, this stitching is perfect. It can be removed in a few days, but I think this is going to leave a scar. Sorry."
Rose gives him a soft grin before she lifts her hand to get a good look at her scar. "Don't be, I was the dumbass that got injured. Besides, battle scars like these are fucking awesome!"
Chopper still doesn't like it, and Rose can tell, so she pets his head with a gentle grin. "I'll try to be more careful in my fights, but you shouldn't be so worried. The best doctor in the world is here to fix me up after all."
"You stupid bitch! You can't make compliments like that to get off easy!" Chopper's harsh words contradict his actions when he starts dancing with a goofy grin that gets his patient giggling.
She feels her spirits lift slightly from the sweet sight, before she points to the patch that's making her half blind. "How long do I need to wear the patch for?"
He finishes dancing from the medical question and looks at his handiwork. "I think in two days your eye will be fully healed with that. Just try not to take it off before then."
Rose can only nod at him, before her stomach starts to growl loud enough to be mistaken for an animal.
The reindeer flinches at the scary sound, but Rose chuckles at his reaction before she stands up. "We should go eat before Luffy eats our food."
"Right!" He watches her start to leave, be she abruptly stops at the doorway.
Chopper hums in confusion when he watches her take her backpack off, then digs into her bag, until she takes out the research material she took from the ship. "Before we go, mind if I leave this with your luggage. I'd rather not take it with me."
He nods to the harmless request and watches her leave the books, and box, in his case of books, before he leads her to the dining area to see most of the crew finishing their meals. Sanji though was already prepared for this, so when he sees the new arrivals, he grabs two box lunches and walks towards them.
Once he approaches the new arrivals, he hands them each a box with a sorry look. "Sorry, I couldn't stop Luffy from waiting anymore. I packed these for you guys to eat while we're out. You still want to come with me Chopper?"
The reindeer nods then follows him out to their search for Robin.
Rose watches them leave for a second before she turns to see Luffy and Nami are approaching her.
"You ready to go Rose?" Nami asks with the brunette nodding, then following them out of the building.
Once the three of them got on a boat, with a yagara attached to it, Nami is driving the boat while the couple is sitting in the back of the boat.
While Luffy is looking at the newspaper to see the story of the incident for himself, Rose is eating the boxed lunch that Sanji made, and thinking up what to do next. She knows that Iceburg will be blaming them for the attack because he saw Robin's face, while she was masked.
This way, the stage can be set tonight with CP 9's second attempt. What worries her though is that she's sure the other unit will be joining them this time too. It was bad enough with CP 9 there, but this unit actually has haki...
She takes a hard swallow in the last bite of her food, when she remembers how she was beaten down by those agents. At least she learned something from her escape, she has a fighting chance in a one on one battle with them. And now that she's had a taste of their abilities, she can prepare for tonight.
A smirk begins to grace her lips as she starts coming up with different ideas for each agent, and looks through her bag's outer pocket for the different dials that she brought for combat.
After a few minutes of looking through the shells for possible strategies, Luffy notices her focus on them. "What are you doing?"
Rose's finger slips from the sudden question and accidentally activated the flame dial, in her hand, to shoot a small flame at Luffy.
He flinches back from the flame throwing shell, when Rose rushes to turn it off before it can hurt him. She releases an awkward chuckle as she keeps the orange shell in her hand. "Sorry about that, I was going over my dial inventory. How much farther until we get there?"
"Almost there." Nami answers as she sees dock one in the distance. However, it was difficult for them to approach the closed door to the dock because there are dozens of people both on the road, and on boats trying to get in to hear about their mayor's condition.
"Whoa, this is crazy." Luffy comments as they try to get as close as possible, but there's no way for them to get inside through boat.
Nami looks over to the wind girl when she thinks of a way to get them inside. "Hey Rose, think you can get us flying over?"
She goes to nod, but freezes when she hears a drum playing throughout the area.
The three pirates grow confused by the music, especially when they see some of the locals getting scared from the sound.
"Oh no!"
"That rhythm!"
"Not Franky!"
"Franky?! Like in the Franky Family?" Nami asks when she remembers that being the name of the gang leader that attacked Usopp and stole their money.
"AOW, DID SOMEONE JUST SAY MY NAME?!" The pirates, along with everyone else in the area look up to see a buff man, with blue hair, wearing bikini bottoms, and a Hawaiian shirt, dancing in the middle of two bikini clad girls.
Even though this weird man is being booed at every corner by the townspeople, he ignores them and continues preaching as if he's doing a show. "THAT'S RIGHT, THE ISLAND'S MOST SUPER MAN IS HERE TODAY! STRAW HAT, I KNOW YOU'RE HERE! SHOW YOURSELF!"
"I'M RIGHT HERE PANTY MAN!" Luffy calls out to him, and stands up in rage of him hurting Usopp, while the girls sit back.
Franky is quick to spot the pirate captain, and is pissed off at the sight of him. "So, you're Straw Hat Luffy? When I was out, you and your pals did a real good job at messing with my men. I'm gonna pay you back for every hit they took!"
"OH YEA?! COME DOWN HERE THEN, CAUSE I'M THE ONE WHO'S GONNA KICK YOUR SORRY ASS!"
"OH YEA?!" Franky takes a deep breath, which gets the locals on boats to start clearing the way.
While Luffy and Nami are confused by the breath, Rose knows exactly what he's going to pull, so with the flame dial in her hand she flies in front of the boat just when he breathes a furiously powerful fire at them.
Both Luffy and Nami don't try to stop her because they believe that she's just going to block the flames with her wind. Much to their surprise though, she creates a twister out of her free hand, controls them to go around the flames, and funnel them into the dial.
Once the flames are gone, she grins at the newly powered up shell. "That'll work."
She looks back at her crew mates to see them shell shocked. "What? I used a flame dial to catch the fire."
"Warn us when you do that!" Nami answers while Luffy laughs at Rose's quick reflexes.
"OI, DON'T IGNORE ME!" Franky yells at the pirates as he jumps off the door and dives into the water.
Nami widens her eyes at the man's dive because she thought his power was from a devil fruit. "WHAT THE HELL?! WON'T HE DROWN?!"
"Doesn't look like it. Hang on." Rose keeps flying above the ship, then creates a gust of wind around her crew mates to get them flying with her just when Franky's fist emerges from underwater to destroy the boat.
"What the hell?!" Nami asks, more so about how Rose knew Franky was going to attack the boat than of how Franky can both swim and breath fire, but knows that she won't get an answer anytime soon.
Luffy could care less about what just happened when he sees his target's head surfacing. "There you are!"
He pulls his right arm back to throw a punch, but the blue haired man already saw it coming and threw a punch that was stretched by a chain that connects his hand to his arm!
Rose though saw it coming, and got them descending, to avoid the punch and land on the street.
Once Luffy's feet are on the ground, he's ready to fight the weirdo just as he's climbing up to the surface with both arms intact.
Nami looks from Luffy to Franky, and still can't figure out what's going on. "How'd you do that?!"
Franky smirks at the question, and starts cracking his knuckles to get ready to fight. "So you really don't know? I'm a cyborg."
"I don't care what you are! I'm still gonna kick your sorry ass!" Luffy shouts as he throws a punch to start an all-out brawl between him and the cyborg. Whether it be machine guns coming out of Franky's left hand or rubber fists flying faster than cannons, neither side is going down easily for they're both on a mission to avenge their friends from the other.
Both Rose and Nami stay back to watch the crazy fight.
"Kick his ass Luffy!" Nami calls out to cheer for her captain while Rose uses her wind to catch any flying debris, that goes flying from the two brawlers hitting anything that misses their target, to keep it from hitting civilians.
After the fifth plank, Rose looks out to the canal to see Lucci, Kaku, and a group of Galley La employees sailing towards them!
Before she can do anything, a bulky carpenter shoots a bazooka at Luffy and Franky to break up the fight! The blast is quick to blast both Luffy and Franky off of their feet and crash them both into separate piles of carpenter materials.
Luffy is the first to get up to see the angry shipwrights getting off their boats, and is completely confused about why they attacked him. "Hey Paulie, what gives?!"
"Shut the hell up!" The blond carpenter yells as he grabs the ends of the ropes from his jacket sleeves. "How dare you show your face around here after what you did?!"
While most of the bystanders kept their questions about what Paulie means, Franky voices his questions to his opponent. "So you first messed with my family, then you messed with Galley La? What the hell's the matter with you?"
"SHUT UP! WE DIDN'T DO ANYTHING TO THESE GUYS!" Luffy yells which unknowingly pisses off the shipwrights all the more.
"YOU'RE GOING TO JUST STAND THERE AND LIE LIKE THAT?!" Paulie yells as he throws a lasso of rope from his right sleeve towards Luffy, but before the lasso can touch him, Rose blows it to the left to get it to miss the shot.
"What the hell?" Paulie asks because he was sure he wouldn't miss. He soon got his answer though when Kaku and Lucci rush towards the wind girl, and she creates a gust to blow them back.
When the two regained their footing, they looked ready to fight, so Rose gets in a stance. "Nami, you'd better stay back."
Nami hesitates to take a step back from the upcoming brawl, and looks over to Paulie. "Wait, what the hell's going on?! Why are you attacking us Paulie?!"
"Don't act like you don't know! Iceburg woke up and told us that your crewmember Nico Robin tried to kill him!"
Nami couldn't believe the accusation and steps up to deny it. "That's impossible, Robin wouldn't do that!"
"Iceburg confirmed her identity himself! You can't lie to me!"
"If Robin did do it, then she acted on her own! The crew had nothing to do with it!" Rose calls out, but Lucci's not having it when he goes to punch her, but she lets his fist phase through her.
A pigeon, that's been sitting on Lucci's shoulder the whole time, starts flying to a safe location as he speaks up. "She's a part of your crew, so that automatically makes you guys responsible."
Rose clicks her tongue at the comment when Kaku and Lucci go at her again, but she blasts a gust of wind to push them back again, then grabs a pink shell and a black one from the outer pocket of her backpack. Both carpenters grow confused when they attack again, only for her to start using these shells as shields.
The wind girl does her best not to smirk when she keeps using the Kaku and Lucci's attacks to charge up the impact and reject dials to use tonight.
Luffy is worse off when the other carpenters surrounding him. They all try to attack the pirate, but he's doing his best to dodge them at every turn. He refuses to fight back though, because he doesn't see a reason to fight since they're innocent.
Even so, he gets more annoyed when he'd still get a cut or two from the carpenter tools being thrown at him. "I'M TELLING YOU ROBIN IS INNOCENT, JUST LET ME TALK TO THE OLD MAN!"
"LIKE HELL, WE'RE GOING TO LET YOU TALK TO HIM!" A carpenter with a bazooka yells as he aims at the rubber man, but had to jump back to avoid Franky's stretched out punch.
"OI, STRAW HAT'S MINE! QUIT INTER-!" Franky's complaint is cut short when the carpenter's bazooka is shot at him instead.
The blast crashes him into a building, and knocks him out in an instant. After the distraction was taken care of, the rest of the carpenters get back to work in their attack against Luffy with the civilians cheer for them in the background.
Nami hasn't a clue on how to handle this, especially when some of the locals are starting to give her an evil look.
"Aren't you one of the pirates?!"
"You're just as guilty, you're not getting away!"
Nami starts backing away and gets her climatact from her belt, but she doesn't feel confident in escaping without a scratch.
From the corner of Rose's eye, she sees Nami being cornered, and Luffy still being attacked, she wants to get them out quickly. At that moment, the shells have blocked Lucci and Kaku's attacks for the fifth time, so there's more than enough fire power. There's no use waiting for Franky to get up and use his move, so she takes the matter into her own hands by speaking in a voice just above a whisper. "Until next time, you jackasses."
The two men widen their eyes when Rose finally fights back by creating a powerful gust, that not only gets them flying, but also Paulie, and the other carpenters that were attacking Luffy.
She's quick to throw them in the water, then while the civilians were horrified by the sight, uses her wind to get her and the others out of there.
Most of the carpenters were able to swim back to the surface, and were aided by the locals to get back ashore. As for Lucci though, Kaku had to drag him up with him to keep him from drowning.
As soon as their heads are above the water, Lucci had to lower his body, so that he's surfaced from the nose up, so that he can growl in the water, without blowing his cover.
Kaku can sense his comrade's anger, and speaks softly so that only the leopard man can hear. "We just need to bide our time until tonight."
Lucci doesn't like the answer, but he knows that there's nothing he can do at the moment. He lifts his head so that his mouth is above the water to show his scowl, but doesn't make any move to speak.
The long nosed agent may be relieved that their cover isn't blown, but that makes him all the more wary of her. She could've cleared the crew's name by saying that she was the one who defended Iceburg from him last night, but pretended to be none the wiser. He's not sure what she has planned, but it can't be anything good. He needs to be on his guard tonight.
Even with Kaku not saying a word about it, he can tell that Lucci is thinking the same, so they both get out of the water, then leave with the rest of Galley La to search for the pirates, and prepare for tonight.
Franky on the other hand just woke up to see that his prey is gone, and is beyond pissed. As soon as he gets up, he sees that he's being completely ignored. He growls at the disrespect, but knows that they're not important. What's important right now is to find those bastard pirates, and get the revenge he deserves.
He runs off to the streets to restock his cola, and return to his search for the Straw Hats.
*********************************************
After escaping from Galley La, Rose sets the three of them down on a high rooftop, that's a block away from Iceburg's mansion.
Once she's not flying anymore, the wind girl puts her dials back in her bag, looks out to see that no one's spotted them up there yet, then looks to her crewmates. "We should be safe here for a bit. You guys alright?"
"Yea, but I can't believe this. Robin wouldn't do that." Luffy says as he looks to the house that's surrounded by journalists.
Nami on the other hand looks to the wind girl for answers. "You were the last one to see her yesterday. Did she say anything to you?"
Rose keeps her best poker face on to answer her, without gaining suspicion. "She didn't say anything about wanting Iceburg dead. I doubt she even heard of him before we got here. There has to be an explanation for this, but Robin's the only one that can give it to us."
"If not Robin, then the old man." Luffy answers before he points to the house that he's been staring at. "You guys think that's Ice Pop's house?"
The girls look toward the mansion, with Rose acting just as curious as Nami is about the place. The wind girl stays quiet about the location, that's surrounded by journalists and carpenters alike, but the navigator is quick to speak up. "That has to be Iceburg's mansion. If we go in there without a plan, we'd be even worse off, so-!"
CRASH!
Both girls flinch at the sound of a window breaking and look to the mansion to see that the window on the top floor has been broken into.
They look at where Luffy used to be, to see that he's no longer in his spot, and can tell that he rocketed himself inside.
"WHAT THE HELL?!"
"SOMEONE INVADED THE MANSION!"
"IT'S STRAW HAT LUFFY, GET HIM!"
As the various kinds of shouts were made from the mansion, Nami wonders why the hell she bothered warning him to be careful in the first place.
Rose on the other hand, can't help but release a chuckle before she gently removes Chopper's eye bandage. She groans at the pain from removing it, blinks a few times to regain some sight in her blackened eye, then she looks at Nami. "I'd better go too. I'm gonna try to find Robin."
"Wait, we should stay together!" Nami voices her complaints, and with Rose not disappearing yet, she has hope that she's listening to her.
That hope is quick to die though, when Rose gives her friend a hardened look. "I'm sorry, but if my hunch is right, then she, and whoever else is responsible, won't stop with Iceburg just being injured. If I can't find her, then I need to prepare for tonight."
"What are you talking about?!"
"You'll see soon enough. Just know I'll do whatever I can to get her back to you guys." Rose gives her one last reassuring grin, before she transforms into a gust of wind.
Nami tries to stop her by grabbing onto her, but all she'd grab was air. Once invisible to the naked eye, Rose flies off to try to search for their friend, and come up with a strategy for the upcoming battle.
*****************************************
Throughout the day at the island's coastline, Usopp has been hard at work fixing the ship's damage. He's been mainly working on the deck, and outer hull of the ship, but won't look at the ship's keel. He knows that if he sees it, then it'll prove that Luffy was right about Merry's condition, and he just isn't ready to see the truth yet. If anything, he's trying his best to find some kind of hope in fixing her.
"Don't worry Merry, I'm not giving up on you yet. I still have a few tricks to try to fix you." After putting down the last board piece to the deck, he can hear his stomach grumbling loud enough for Zira to hear it from the crow's nest.
The falcon has been watching him hard at work at fixing the ship, and giving comforting words to her all morning. If she didn't know better, she'd thought he was taking care of a dear family member instead of a ship. She softly grins at the boy's dedication, as she watches him get off the boat to get some lunch, but when she looks to the island, she finds something troubling in the distance.
That being a mob of at least 2 dozen people, carrying all kinds of weapons, rushing to the ship.
Usopp hasn't noticed them yet, because they're half a mile away. When Zira sees him walking in their direction though, she decides to act by calling out to him. "OI, A MOB'S COMING! YOU GOTTA HIDE!"
Usopp flinches at the strange voice, and looks around for the source, but he can't find it anywhere. When he starts to hear footsteps from the upcoming mob though, he decides to listen to the mystery voice by running to the nearby boulders and hiding behind them.
When he looks over the edge of the rock, he sees the crowd climbing aboard the ship and searching for something, but it doesn't look like they're finding it.
Lucky for Zira, even though the mob can see her, they think that she's just a normal bird. The falcon takes that to her advantage and flies about ten feet in the direction that they came from before she masquerades Luffy's voice. "OI LOSERS! YOU GUYS LOOKING FOR ME, STRAW HAT LUFFY?! THEN COME AT ME YOU PUNK ASS BITCHES!"
"Straw Hat?!"
"Is he fucking toying with us?!"
"Let's get him!"
Usopp's is dumbfounded, from the sight of the mob suddenly leaving as quick as they came in to follow Luffy's voice. While he may be grateful that they're gone, there's no way Luffy'd taunt people at a distance like that. So who helped him out?
"The coast is clear now."
The sniper yelps in shock from the feminine voice, that gave him the warning, and looks around for it. He sees the bird on the rock he was hiding behind, but then looks around the rock, because he doesn't think she did it.
Zira notices this, and loses her cool enough to fly straight up to his face! "Oi, don't ignore me when I just covered your sorry ass! At least CONSIDER that I did it!"
Usopp jumps back in fright, with a high-pitched shriek, with his hands up in defense. "A TALKING BIRD?!"
Zira can't believe that he's freaking out like this, when she literally saw him going after a talking reindeer last night. She perches back on the rock, and gives him a wilted look. "Wow, Rose is right, you are jumpy..."
Usopp stops being scared at the mention of his friend, and looks up at the bird. "You know Rose?"
"Yea, we met yesterday, and we watched you going back to your ship after you fought your captain. We decided that I stay here to make sure you're ok, while she returned to the crew."
The sniper starts to feel more at ease from the comment, because when he didn't see Rose at the fight last night, he was worried that something bad happened to her. But at the same time, he feels even more guilty from how he lashed out at her last night...
He tiredly rubs his face with both hands, as if the thought can just be rubbed away. When he lowers them, he looks at the bird to try to change the topic. "Well, thanks for helping get the mob away from Merry. What's your name anyway?"
"I'm Zira, and you're Usopp right?"
"Yup, wanna go have lunch with me?"
Zira is slightly surprised by the sudden offer, but is more than glad to accept by flying besides him. "Yea, let's go!"
Usopp releases a soft grin at the bird's friendliness, and can see that if they were with the crew, she and Chopper could be friends. He chuckles at the weird thought of the two talking animals, of completely different species hanging out, then walks off to the city, while getting to know his new friend.
*********************************************
Hours after Rose had gone on her own, Luffy and Nami managed to not only escape Iceburg's mansion, but find both Chopper and Zoro.
They were able to hide on a high rooftop, from the local mobs that are after him, and try to regroup on what's going on.
As Chopper explains what happened when he and Sanji saw Robin, he feels regret for not being able to stop Robin at all. "Then after Robin told us she was leaving, Sanji went on his own saying that he had a plan..."
Nami softens up at Chopper's explanation, and remembers what Rose said before she left. "Rose apparently had one too. She said that if she couldn't find her, then she had to prepare for tonight. She must've figured that they won't stop until Iceburg's dead."
Zoro's face hardens at the comment, because even though Rose verified Robin's innocence, he knows that neither girl is safe. If they caught Rose once before, there's a good chance for it to happen again. And yet, she's forcing herself to face them alone while having everyone else focus on Robin.
Well, two can play at that game. If she wants Luffy to focus on convincing Robin that she belongs with them, it's fine, but he'll be damned if he doesn't back her up in the meantime.
With the plan to secretly back Rose up is set in the swordsman's mind; he looks over to his captain. "What's the plan Luffy?"
Luffy's hat was shadowed over his face the whole time, but once he was asked the question, he lifts his face to look to the others to give his decision. "We go to the mansion tonight to bring Robin back. Once we have her back, we'll find out the truth."
"Right." Nami answers with the others agreeing with the plan.
He gets up, with the others following, and heads off to the mansion where they plan to find their crew mate for answers.
********************************************
With the last drops of sunlight escaping into the horizon, the members of Galley La welcome the darkness of night with a mission to protect their mayor from another assassination attempt. On the outside of the mansion, hundreds of carpenters are outside, various kinds of weapons in hand, and practically creating a human barrier around the building.
Robin and both cipher pol units, with the exception of Kaku and Lucci, are watching the blockade from a nearby rooftop, see the carpenters as more like sheep waiting to be slaughtered than a threat.
When each assassin is donned in masks, Rufus looks over to CP9, with the urge to see how far he and the others in his unit have to wait for their target. "My men and I got this; you go deal with your mayor."
With that, Robin, Blueno, and Kalifa rush off to get to their goal.
As for CP 8, they're more than ready for the goal in hand. Rufus lifts his hand, to create a white wax sphere. Once made to the size of a cannon ball, he throws it down to the courtyard.
The carpenters grow confused by the weird ball, with a few going to approach, but flinch when it starts to blow!
The explosion wasn't strong enough to hit the house, but it had enough force to send the closer carpenters experiencing some serious burns. Once the smoke clears, the majority of the carpenters' attention was moved over to the spot, and see a masked ninja practically appearing out of nowhere.
"GET HIM!" One of the carpenters screech out with a mob charging at him.
Nishiki smirks under the mask, and with a ninja sword in hand, he goes for the kill. Neither side gets the chance though, when a masked girl materializes in between them, with her arms as power gusts to blow both sides of the fight back.
When Nishiki recovers from the blast, he sees that the rest of his unit has joined him to confront the demon in front of them.
The carpenters watch the newcomer in both confusion and astonishment, because she's only paying attention to the four intruders. If they want to go ahead and kill each other though, they don't have any objections to it, so they stay back for the time being.
Each agent is ready to fight the masked girl, but at the same time, they were confused as to why she has an orange shell strapped on top of her stomach, a pink shell strapped to her right hand, and a black shell strapped to the back of her left one. The look would have been ridiculous, had the menacing look in her purple eyes not made her threatening to anyone who so much as spared a glance at them.
The four fighters didn't let themselves get intimidated by the glare, and rush to attack their target.
Rose is quick to act by blocking the four man assault with a cyclone blasting from one hand to push them back, then creates two marble sized orbs with the other to throw at the agents.
Nishiki and Rufus manage to gain their bearing enough to sky walk out of the way of the weird attack. Lareos and Andreos weren't so lucky though, for just when they were about to follow their comrades, each marble makes contact with them, expanding into large domes, and trapping them inside. The orbs hit the ground, but they didn't disappear. Instead, they thrashed the two agents around in the cyclones.
Rufus doesn't bother to look back at his comrades, and instead goes after Rose again. He infuses his arms with armament haki, and in a flash goes for the strike, but she flies up to dodge.
Nishiki took the chance, by sky walking behind her about to strike, but Rose could hear the air shift behind her, so she turns her right arm into air, but keeps the shell strapped to it visible just when she swings it backwards. As soon as the impact dial hits Nishiki's stomach, an explosion that can compete with Rufus' bomb from earlier sends both fighters flying in opposite directions!
While Nishiki flew through a window into the mansion, Rose flew forward straight towards Rufus, who took the chance to sky walk to her direction before the explosion. The bomber is quick to go higher with his sky walk, to throw a small bomb down at her.
Rose manages to create a dome of wind around herself to act as a shield, but the force of the attack was still powerful enough to send her plummeting to the ground.
She manages to catch herself on a gust of wind before she lands, but barely had enough time to breathe when she sees that Lareos and Andreos are out of their traps, and charging at her at full speed.
Andreos goes for a side strike of his sword, but she flies up to dodge, only to receive a haki packed punch in the face by Lareos.
She's sent flying, with her logia body phasing through a tree, but she was able to catch her balance in flight to see the three agents sky walking at her. She can feel a slight pain in her right arm from using the impact dial, but thanks to her airy body, it's nothing compared to what Usopp's dealt with. She's already taking a win for starting to thin the numbers, she just needs to keep the battle flowing.
With a devilish smirk behind the mask, she begins to cackle in the insane delight of the thrill of the battle. "Let's fucking go!"
**************************************************
In the second floor of the mansion's hallway, glass has shattered all throughout the floor thanks to Nishiki's not so graceful flight. And thanks to him not getting into iron body until after the explosion, his stomach is experiencing some terrible injuries at the moment.
He stumbles up on shaking legs, but all he can see is red. First, she gave him a sucker punch of a headbutt when they caught her, she kicked him in the balls during interrogation, injured both his arms during her escape, and now she tries to blow him up?! That's the last straw for him, he could care less about the order to keep her alive anymore! "When I get my hands on that fucking wind bitch, I'm going to give her the slowest death possible!"
"A wind bitch?"
The ninja flinches at the new voice, and looks to his right to see Zoro walking around as if he's lost.
That being because after the crew snuck into the mansion, he snuck off to find Rose, but all these hallways are so confusing, that they kept putting him in circles.
When he sees this ninja though, he's starting to think that he went the right way. Getting on the defensive, he draws two of his swords while making sure he has the right target. "You're after the wind girl?"
The cipher pol agent is confused by the question for the moment, until he recognizes Zoro from his bounty poster. A dark chortle begins to emanate from him, as he draws his ninja sword. "That's right, and when I kill you, I'll break her spirit by showing her your corpse!"
He instant shaves to disappear to the naked eye, but Zoro's instincts kick into overdrive, by sensing where he was about to strike, and blocks the blow. He pushes the ninja back and gets into a stance. "A pirate versus a ninja, huh? This should be exciting..."
With a devilish smirk of his own, Zoro rushes in to commence the fight, with his intent to kill reaching the same level as his opponent's.
TO BE CONTINUED