"This was the girl I was MOST interested in meeting," Big Mom laughs. Did that mean you? Big Mom was interested in you? Of course she was.. Otherwise you wouldn't be here right? "Why are you hiding her from me like she's some kind of secret?!" Big Mom complained pointing a finger towards your face. The king and queen apologized profusely and bowed their heads. You weren't sure what to do so you stood their stupidly. You'd really wished you'd taken a class on how to behave in front of a Pirate Emperor of the Sea. Sure you'd been taught fine etiquette from the very best tutors money could buy but nothing seemed to prepare you for a moment like this! You give a polite and simple curtsy. You wonder what kind of a fool your step brother is making out of himself beside you, but you don't dare take the attention off Big Mom by turning your head to see. "Pull your veil back, my dear, it's not your wedding day yet," she muses. You turn your head to the king and queen as if to ask for their consent but you get a stern talking to from Big Mom instead, "Don't look to their authority. The only authority here is mine. You do as I say or you die!" She laughs.
That's comforting, you think, then you reprimand yourself because now is not the time for your sarcastic humor. You take a deep breath and pull the veil from your face, anticipating a familiar reaction of awe and then the following terror. Because you're a beautiful devil princess. But the awe lingered from around the room, and the terror never came. You now realized just how many people had come into the throne room only to see your face. You didn't remember it being this crowded initially when you'd first walked in. But maybe you were only really focusing on Big Mom. You feel hot and flushed. You'd never received such undivided attention before, such lingering unaverted stares. Where were the other pretty girls to take some attention away from you? To save you from such intensity.. There must have been over 100 sets of eyes on you. Or.. maybe you were just imagining that number because of how nervous you felt.
"She's a doll!" Big Mom exclaims which makes you blush harder. "Didn't I tell you how beautiful she was, Katakuri!" Big Mom said leaning over her right shoulder to talk to her son without taking her eyes off of you. Sweet Commander Charlotte Katakuri, you remember reading up on him in the library and then.. there was your conversation with your brother on the ship... You couldn't get a good look at him, he was covered in the shadow of Big Mom, but you could see his piercing red eyes in the darkness, staring at you. "Yes Mama, she's beautiful," you heard Katakuri's deep voice agree and you stop breathing altogether. Time itself had stopped.
You weren't ready for this. You needed more time. More books, more studying. More instruction. Something! You felt faint. This was a dream, right? "So pretty Mama!" You hear a little girl say, but you don't recognize who. You hoped you didn't look sick or scared. You hoped you looked calm and collected. You hoped the feelings inside you hadn't emerged and weren't written plainly across your face. Please, you pray, please let this be over soon. It felt like an eternity since you'd taken your veil off. Normally you'd be glad to rip the thing apart, but now, you missed its shield. "Now," Big Mom continued, "show us your powers!" You gasp and you can't help the look of shock on your face. This makes Big Mom laugh, "come now, you didn't think I'd marry you to one of my sons without ensuring your worth. Show me, don't be shy."
You fight the urge to glare at the king and queen for not telling you that this would be asked of you. You know if you even looked at them, it would upset Big Mom. Because SHE was the only authority here. There was no one here to help you. No one to save you. It was up to you to either shine or fail right here, right now. You hadn't trained yourself. You can't do this stuff willingly. You've spent your whole life suppressing your abilities. Now you're the center of attention, all eyes on you, you're a circus waiting to perform. You look at one of the soldiers nearest to you. If you focused hard enough.. maybe ... just maybe.. You close your eyes and shut out the world. Forget everyone else. Forget where you are. Forget who you're with. Let this be only a display for you. Do this for yourself, if only to prove that you still can.
You feel confidence building inside of you. You reach a hand out towards the guard on your left. You could feel his presence there, even without opening your eyes. He couldn't be more than a few feet away, he was an easy target. Hopefully this small gesture was enough to appease Big Mom. Hopefully she and everyone else will see this as how controlled and restrained you are. Hopefully they see it that way and not look past that into the great amount of effort just to contact your disconnected abilities. Like a side of yourself you never talk to. Like a shoe box filled with memories that you shove under your bed and forget. You allow the darkness to creep out from inside of you and fill your mind and your soul. You break down the wall you'd built up to keep the monster at bay. When you open your eyes you'd already reached across the room and instilled your will into your victim. That poor soldier near you. You leech onto his mind and force him to come to you. He cries in pain and you wince. I'm so sorry, you think. He walks towards you with his sword unsheathed, brandished and pointing at you.
"No! Not that! I can't! They'll kill me if I do!" He screams. Yes, this, you think, I'm sorry. You have to do it. The only ability you've ever perfected. You can heal yourself better than anything. You hadn't inserted your will on someone else since that boy you couldn't save. You're pleasantly surprised to see you can still do it at all. You force the soldier to raise up his sword high and gash open your left arm in its descent. Your blood spills across the floor. You don't cry, you don't wince, you don't gasp. The queen faints at the sight but you don't see that. You're too focused on healing now. You wave your right hand over your arm and force your cells to repair themselves double time. If there wasn't your blood on the soldier's sword, your clothing, and the floor.. No one would have thought anything had happened. The wound was gone. You were whole again.
You were so proud of yourself! You did it! But what did everyone else think? You turned towards your family. You see the queen on the floor, the king and your brother's look of horror. Oh no! You messed up big time didn't you! You showed too much or maybe the wrong thing! This was it, you were dying right here. Then the silence was broken by Big Mom's laughter. Was that good or bad? Good, you hoped. "Kill him!" She demanded. What, you think, who!? Kill who? Who offended her? "Kill that soldier now!" She said again. In an instant he was dead on the floor, you didn't even see how it happened. You looked up at Big Mom, wanting to demand an explanation, but you knew better than to open your mouth. Big Mom smiled, "no one harms any guest of mine." She cooed. "I forced him to do it," you chimed in whether or not it was the smartest thing to do, "he didn't want to." Big Mom raised an eyebrow, "Yes my dear, we all saw that, you're a wonder! What a good show! You must be exhausted. See you at The Tea Party. You will be shown to your rooms now." Big Mom give you a cute little wave, you've been officially dismissed.
You curtsy again and follow your family out of the room. The queen is carried behind you by soldiers. You pass by the body on the floor, the soldier you had condemned. You had done that. You killed an innocent life, again. You push the darkness back down inside of you like a hard to swallow pill. You're just happy to be out of that room now. Innocent people weren't safe in your presence. You deserved to be married to a Charlotte, you thought, you're a monster. You're shown to a room and are relieved to find that you have a private room all to yourself. You shut the door, not hearing anything anyone on the other side was saying as you did it. Whether it was important or not, who cared? You were alone, finally! You got time to yourself!
You ran around the room looking at everything. Your closet is filled with pretty and extravagant dresses in your size, the vanity is stocked with makeup and the bathroom is filled with perfumes and soaps. The first thing you do is jump onto your bed and test out its comfiness. You're pleasantly surprised. It felt like laying on a cloud. Then you remember the blood on your dress and you hope you didn't soil your comforter. You walk into the bathroom and stare at yourself in the full length mirror.
Your clothes are soaked in your blood. You stare at your face, not used to seeing it. Is that all? You didn't feel like your reflection deserved a life of being called the beautiful devil princess. "You're not a beautiful princess," you say to your reflection, "you're a murderer." A tear falls down your cheek. You undress in front of the mirror and turn around to see the scar on your back. A reminder that you weren't as perfect as everyone thought you were. You sigh sadly and start the bathtub, ready to scrub the shame away. You purposefully make the temperature slightly hotter than is comfortable, to punish yourself. There's a basket of oils and soaps on a table next to the tub. You greedily open them all and smell each one. Gingerbread, sugar cookie, apple cinnamon, peach cobbler, pumpkin pie. Your stomach rumbles. You pick 'sugar cookie' and lather it across your chest until it bubbles. You run your fingers through your long and wavy hair, and massage the soap into your scalp.