The whole island stink of something foul - like dried blood and rotting flesh. It clings on the air like the tension that continue to boil at every suspicious glare and scowl of the passing locals.
"Slaves.." y/n muttered with an utter of disbelief, pity and anger coiling on her gut.
The red haired pirates did not utter a single world, only walk. Even Shank, whose hand were bundle into a tight fist - had his eyes stuck on the ground.
Slaves littered every corner and every road of the island, dirty they were, clothed by filthy rags who had gone brown over their pitiful life.
They look so thin, some of them only hanging by their bone, cheek bone prominent and look as it could cut. Those people who wore nothing but a single pants or torn up shorts had their ribs bulging out of their own body, stomach so thin and covered with scars.
Even the children weren't spared by the unfortunate life. They look so young and yet so so tired, eyes so dull it could compare to a dead man, deprived of any life or any joy. lips dried and body so boney y/n wonders if they could snap with a single flick. They walk as if the whole world is on their shoulder, and maybe it is, a child so young should not carry such burden or wonder if somehow, some way, they would finally be free and live a life they all desire.
Y/n balled her fist, tight with her knuckles turning white.
She was lucky enough to not be subjected in such life but back in her old life, she too yearns for freedom, too get away from the life of torment and violence, dream of the day she could no longer carry a rifle, to run so freely on the fields without bullets raining on her back. She knows how to yearn for something that she thought she could not have, to let her young palm hold the despair of her life and let bruised feet carry her forward because she know her mind could not.
"Oh the red haired pirates! I never thought a day would come where I would see a yonko in my own eyes!" The man was large as he was fat, standing in 6'2 with a well kept moustache and a cunning eyes. He grin up to them happily, clapping merrily while something suspicious brewing on the glint of his pearly white teeth.
"Are you here to scout for slaves hm? Oh you must have know today is the day we shift different goods on their respective auction shop! As expected for a legendary pirates like you!"
That explain the hundreds of ship line up' y/n had thought.
Y/n looked up to him with hard eyes, face deprived of any emotion as she tried her best to calm the simmering anger swirling on her gut.
'Not the time' she said to herself
'Not the time to let loose'
Even if she wants to yank the mustache off his face and slam his head on the wall until he was nothing but blood and brains y/n knows she could not, her anger would not do any good.
Shanks took a second to reply before he too looked up, a fake grin plastered on his face.
"Oh no! We are here only by a coincidence!" He scratched his head
"And I have no interest getting myself a slave or two! The ship is working fine with only us"
"I take it you've never get yourself a pet before hm? as you do not know how truly useful they are!" Y/n clenched her jaw, referring these unfortunate people as 'pet' and viewing them as an object makes her sick to her stomach.
"I suggest you get one this instant! Look, I have here a good one-" the fat bastar had raised a hand before suddenly a man appeared out of thin air, smoke emitting before they could see who it was.
'He has a Devil fruit' she had thought. 'If I could put his head on the sea he will quickly die'
There stood a young man, early 20's, big he was, taller than the bastard with a define muscle outlining out of his thin tight shirt. He has scars and cigarette burns, eyes duller than the night sky and lips chapped and painted with light dried blood.
"This is dog," the bastard patted him at the back, 'dog' stumbled forward, eyes still stuck on the ground. "He will follow everything you say no matter how hard, how many.." the bastard had grinned then, almost feral before meeting
y/n's eyes "..no matter how filthy"
Y/n could feel the hot anger bubbling on her throat, clawing on her neck and burning her veins. So familiar, like the one she felt back on her old boat, when she had punch a sea king so hard she carved a hole. But this time, instead of the cold of fear wrapping around her body, it was anger, it made her gut scorched as if she was a walking burning coal ready to turn everything she touch into ashes and dust.
A weight placed itself on her shoulder.
Benn pulled her towards him, almost shielding her from the view of the seller.
"We dont need him" he stared down at the man, grey eyes dark under the shadow of his eye. "Our captain said-"
"I-i know what your captain said!" The seller had backed away, sweating out of his own clothes, soaking the fabric. "But-but I just thought I could change your mind, y-you know dog here is a capable man! Ve-very strong! And obedient! L-look I'll show you-!" The bastard had the audacity to grab the mans shoulder before yelling "kneel!"
'Dog' the pitiful man with hair as filthy as the ground kneeled slowly, automatically pushing his head towards the ground before licking his shoes.
"See?! He obey-"
Y/n had punched him.
His jaw bone gave a sickening crack that echo through the tense air, defeaning silence gave its entrance as the shadow of anger painted her eyes.
Y/n gritted her teeth, nerves bulging out of her neck as she took the bastard collar - not even letting him fall to the ground before she kicked him on his stomach.
"You sicken me.." she mumbled through her punch, blood flew every where her fist met, she could feel the crews hand holding her back, could feel their nails digging on her shoulder but she did not relent, her body moving on it's own anger. "How could you do this? How could you live like this you fucking monster!"
The bastard lay beneath her, bloody and bruised and yet he smiled even if his jaw ached, even his teeth fell one by one.
"Y/n! Fuck stop!" Shanks yanked her off of him with a hanki infused hand, frowning with worry as Limejuice continue to mumble things that she could not hear because of the ringing on her ears.
"-marine would...-admiral....have to....go..we cant...-this bad.."
Limejuice voice were muffled, like he was stuck floating under the water.
Y/n breathed heavily, cold sweat dripping down her neck.
"Y-you dont know how it's like.. " she mumbled through frantic eyes, meeting the stare of Dog who looked at him like he was seeing sun for the first time.
"To be deprived of any good thing that should have been yours the moment you were born! you don't know the feeling of being shackles on your own feet, the pain of acceptance that you would-you would be a slave for the rest of your fucking life!"
Tears fell from her eyes, one by one. Shank's hand fell from her arm.
"to wake up every morning and wish that something could change! Even just a little bit..." her lips trembled and she suddenly felt weak.
"To pray on every god there is and beg them to hear your prayers! To reduce yourself to dirt for an ounce of praise and fleeting moment of satisfaction! Y-you dont know what its like-" she met the fat bastard eyes "you dont know what it's like to live wishing for death at every waking moment!"
"Y/n..."
"What?" The bastard stood up with wobbly feet before chuckling, then he was laughing, too loud and too fucking defeaning.
It reminder her of the people back on Marley, with their feet on her back as she tried to crawl for the fallen bread she had drop.
"You're one of those arent you?" He asked through bloody teeth, looking like a maniac. "One of those righteous one who think they can change how the world works, you think you know it all dont you? naive little girl." He laughed, blood dripping from his mouth.
"I met one of you before y'know? Not too long ago, he was a very brave man but very stupid! Such a fool who think he can control the world with only a simple moving speech, how we should respect others and how violence and money wasnt always the answer, oh but it was! Power is power and money makes the society spin like a fucking fiddle" he twirled his hand, giggling while doing so. "You know what happened to him? You wanna know huh?!" The bastard yanked Dog upwards with an arm before pushing him forward.
"Well there he is!"
Y/n's breath hitched.
"Stupid little fucker finally understand how the world works" he stated "how the weak and the foolish stay on the ground while the powerful and rich stood above them!"
Dog looked down on the ground, dull eyes possibly more darker than before. Slumping down and trying to hide on his own shadow.
"You would understand it too someday, little girl. I mean you're starting to learn it know right?! After all you're a pirate!" He laughs, joyful. "Pirates are the scum of the ocean! preying those who are below them. ransacking villages and town, orphaning children and taking women to use and abuse for their own satisfaction and hey! you woudlnt be here if you dont enjoy it wouldnt you hm?" He had asked, leaning in. "Dont you, red hair? You like it right? The power in your hands? You love it when they struggle when you kill them dont you? You're addicted to the feeling of blood, the screams of the damn, the pleadings of the weak! You're a yonko afterall! Youre no innocent when it comes to this things no matter how many rumours of you being a hero, you could not deny that you and I are the same." He grinned maniacally "powerful people like us deserve to stand above them, weaklings are meant to be on the ground, begging for their life and writhing in pain"
Shanks looked down, hand gripped tight. The air felt impossibly colder now, the harsh stench of the sea were replaced by the irony tang of the bastard's drying blood.
"We stood on the top and we both enjoy it" the man had grinned, eyes glinting and chin smeared with blood and spit. "Dont we, red hair?"
_________________
Shanks never wanted to be a pirate, he wanted the freedom of it but none of the filth. He knew he was being selfish, he knew it was impossible but Shank chase it like a boy would on his broken car toy.
He never knew his father, had never even seen a glimpse of his red hair that his mother told him he got from him, but she said his old man's was much darker than his, much more messier, a head full of unkempt crimson hair that sparkles like rubies under the light of both the moon and sun.
Her mother told him when he was a toddler that his father was a Baker, then a carpenter when he was a young kid, it becomes different at every passing year, at first he thought that his father just had many jobs, a delusion created by the mind of a young child, but when he reached the age where secrets were meant to be explore and curiosity is what stirs him, her mother finally told him that his father was once a pirate.
Not a well known one, he has a crew of only 5 people, 4 of those were his childhood friends while the the other one was a friend he had made along the way. His father main priority was money, always money, a wealth he had promise to his mother that could make them live as kings and queens. He had sought after a unique treasure that hidden beneath the caves of an island closest to Laugh Tale, The sapphire isle they called it, a name based on the water that surrounded it that sparkles like blue gemstones underneath the glare of the sun.
Shanks had yet to reach it, but Rayleigh had. The dark king had told him that the treasure his father were desperate of was poured into a pile of treasure they had collected along their journey to the last island. The treasure of the sapphire isle, one that his father died trying to get, is The One piece.
Shanks doesnt want to be the pirate king, he never desired to sit on the throne and dictates what's right or what's wrong. Truth to be told he wasnt born to play a leader, much less a King, to ruled over those who looked up to him that some of them, undoubtedly, is much better than him.
A glimpse of a young boy who had a grin as large as Roger and who carry a dream as large as the world came to his mind.
'Yes..' Shanks had thought 'there are people out there who is much better than I'
Despite of his thoughts, Shank knows he wasnt a good man. Not when he enjoyed what he does, preen under the attention and the fearful gazes of those he had slain or spare.
'Maybe we truly are alike..'
"What? No need to be ashamed! Embrace what you are!" The man had blurted out, cocky with his bloody teeth out in display.
"Stop fucking pretending that you're some goody two shoes pirate! No matter how much you pretend it wouldnt change the truth y'know?"
Shanks frowned, jaw bone clenching in despair. His words are hitting far too close, opening a wound he was so desperately trying to close.
"The world isnt good, if there is a God out there I doubt that he is either" the fat man had shrugged, seemingly not giving a care as his left boot press hard on the back of the slave. Digging on his spine.
"We are put here not to be kind but to survive, so do not be ashamed if you have to kill a few people or two, or hundred, orphan a few children, gut a few women..doesnt matter, we're just trying to survive" He gave him a sickening grin. "Since when did surviving become a sin?"
"When you took it too far"
Y/n punch came fast, the wind parting to give way on its force and straight to the mouth of the bastard.
This time, his crew did not do anything.
Shanks could not move, only watch, stared as the man fell down on his back with blood pouring out his busted mouth, one single tooth lay beside him, bloody and broken. He almost trampled over 'Dog' who cowered quickly on the shadow of a few boxes on the side, shaking and sobbing quietly.
"I believe in god, whether I side with him or not is a question I couldnt still answer but I would be damn if I stand here and let some fat fuck like you act like you have the whole world playing in your goddamn hand" she pressed her own foot on his stomach, just like what he had previously did on Dog. Y/n digged the heel of her foot deeply, almost wanting to see him implode like an over inflated balloon.
"You survive by surviving, by providing what you need, by taking care of yourself, but knowing what you are capable of and could not, by understanding where you stood and what you should do and should not"
She pressed harder, the fat bastard's finger twitch unconsciously on its force.
"You Are not surviving, you're not doing whatever kind of delusion you think you're doing in order to justify what you have done wrong in your life. You are not a human, not a god, you're a fucking monster that's what you are. A fat fucking monster made of stinking shit and rotten flesh, you're created solely to cause pain and to be destroy by the hands of those who are better than you.." she pressed harder and the blood on his mouth started pouring out faster, pooling on his neck.
"Stop this" Benn voice came muffled on the whispers and the distress calls of the locals that surrounded them, even the slaves who stood near were shaking on where they stood.
"People like you makes me sick, pieces of shit who are better of dead" y/n kicked his side, Shank's shivered when a loud sickening crack of his rib rang on the tense atmosphere. "You are a monster dress in human flesh, you have no idea the torment you have done..the pain you had give"
Another kick. One that made the bastard jerk and his closed eyes twitch. Dog trembled on the background.
"Drunk in your imaginary power and accomplishment that you think yourself so fucking godly"
Another kick.
"Think you're invincible just because you have a few people under you?"
Kick
"You act so highly because people are scared of you? Cower before you?"
kick
"Seems like you're so hang up on what you think you are capable of that you forgot. one.fucking thing"
A Kick.
"..That you're not invincible"
Y/n had crushed his skull beneath her foot.
Shank's eyes widen.
Blood and brains explode on the pavement, coloring the ground with sickening crimson. The locals had gasped, some had yelled, theres a few sound of a weapon unsheeting from their scabbard, some had wail and some had backed away.
But Dog..
Dog had approach the twitching corpse.
His scared filthy hands had reach out slowly, touching the blood that painted the ground before he had sob.
Y/n tore her boot away from the corpse with a sickening sound.
"What was it he said earlier?" Her hands were both in her pocket, calm and horrifically casual.
"Oh, that's right I remember" she dusted off her clothes.
"how the weak and the foolish stay on the ground while the powerful stood over them.."
The corpse's lay on the ground, one finger twitching and his own blood pooling beneath him.
"..looks like he was right this time."
_________________ •••• ______________
Late update and i apologize if the story is moving so slowly, this whole chapter is literally just one scene.
Also, i got in on my dream university! Its a state univesity which means i dont have to pay for anything :))