One Piece Fan Fiction ❯ Misrepresented and Misunderstood ❯ Misrepresented ( Chapter 8 )

Recap: Zoro tried in vain to convince his crew that keeping Tashigi onboard was a very bad idea; Tashigi awoke to find herself onboard her worst enemies' ship without her glasses or her trusted Shigure; Smoker made a deal with Hina to recover Tashigi.

 

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Chapter 8 - Misrepresented

 

Zoro sat perched on the edge of the upper deck of the ship, his shirt abandoned, one arm working a weight. From the corner of his eye, he could see the marine girl - Tashigi - standing not too far below him, looking out to sea mournfully. Probably missing “Smoker”, he thought sourly. He still strongly believed that their crew needed to get rid of Tashigi, even if that meant dumping her overboard on a lifeboat with some fresh water and a small ration of food. As long as she was on their ship, the marines would be hot on their heels, and they would be guilty of a crime they had not committed: abducting a naval marine and holding her against her will.

 

Zoro swapped the weight to his other hand, grabbing up a half-drunk bottle of rum from his side and gulping down a sizeable volume of the remains, hissing as it burned at his throat. He heard a small clicking sound below him, but chose to ignore it, keeping his eyes on the sea.

 

“There's more to being a great swordsman than just brute strength, you know!”

 

Zoro turned to scowl down at the marine, who was looking up at him, her hair whipping across her face in the wind.

 

“Yes there is,” he called back to her. “A sense of balance, grace, being prepared at all times and being able to see what lies beyond the end of your own sword!”

 

She pulled a face at him, and, assuming that this signalled the end of their conversation, Zoro returned to working his arm, casting his eyes back out across the water. Privately, he was keeping an eye on the horizon for any ships emblazoned with the blue insignia of the navy. The moment he spotted such a ship, he intended to push the girl overboard and make sure the crew left her there.

 

`I can't do it,' he thought darkly. `I can't push her overboard, she just looks too much like Kuina!'

 

“Stop looking at me with that face!” he snapped, glowering down from the corner of his eye at the girl, who was still watching him.

 

“I was born with this face!” she yelled back.

 

Zoro screwed up his face at her, wondering if she realised how redundant her response was.

 

“I think you have a beautiful face, Tashigi-swan!” Sanji said.

 

Zoro arched his eyebrows sceptically, watching as the loved-up cook approached the marine, trying to win her over with offers of sweet cakes and wine.

 

“Oh no thank you Sanji,” he heard her say. “I don't drink alcohol.”

 

“Ha!” Zoro blurted, grabbing up his bottle of rum again to take another swig.

 

As he replaced the bottle, Zoro looked down to ensure that he had Tashigi's attention.

 

“Face it, you can't drink alcohol!” he called down to her. “You're already a walking disaster with no sense of balance!”

 

“If drinking alcohol will turn me into a bitter, twisted criminal like you, I won't ever drink it!” she yelled back.

 

“Don't give me that crap, you sailors are always getting drunk!” Zoro scoffed.

 

“You know nothing!”

 

“I know a lot more than you! While you've been polishing Smokey's boots, I've been out in the world learning and improving myself and my skills!”

 

The girl yelped out an indignant noise before stepping forwards, disappearing from Zoro's line of sight. He paused, his arm mid-curl, frowning curiously at the deck, wondering what she was trying to do. Zoro did not have to wonder long however, as a moment later, the girl flung herself up onto the upper deck, landing at his side.

 

“Hey!” he cried, eying her over. “Are you stupid? What do you think you're doing? You shouldn't be climbing up like that, you could have fallen!”

 

“Oh what would you care if I did fall and break my neck?” she shot back, planting her hands on her hips.

 

`Because that was exactly what killed Kuina, you reckless idiot girl,' Zoro thought to himself. `Clumsiness, a brief moment of lapsed concentration. One second she was fine, the next she was lying dead at the bottom of a staircase.'

 

“I don't want to have to listen to Smokey cry like a baby when he finds out you died being stupid,” Zoro lied, turning away from her and continuing his exercises.

 

“You don't have to worry about that, Captain Smoker doesn't believe in crying!” she snippily replied.

 

“Then why does he keep you around?” Zoro asked her, smirking as he cast her a sideward glance.

 

Zoro saw her falter, her face turning pale before flushing with colour.

 

“How long am I going to be here?”

 

“What?”

 

Zoro dropped his dumbbell, turning to look directly at the girl.

 

“How long am I going to be here?” she asked him quietly, one hand fidgeting with the empty scabbard she still had tied to her hip. “With you.”

 

Zoro found himself suddenly on his feet, something about the tone of her voice not really settling well with him.

 

“What do you mean with me?” he asked.

 

“Well, I… I thought maybe if I'm going to be your prisoner here for more than a few days, perhaps we could train together.”

 

Zoro cringed back from the girl, eying her over in a state of utter horror. The very last thing he wanted to do was to spend the next few days - possibly even the next few weeks - getting into physical melees with this girl.

 

“No, absolutely not!” he told her confidently.

 

“Why not?” she instantly responded, making Zoro grunt in alarm at her persistence. “We're both swordsmen, we both need to keep our skills sharp. I would have thought that you would have been glad to have someone to spar with.”

 

“But you're not someone to spar with, you're…”

 

Zoro waved his hands about as words escaped him. What was she? He could not consider her a worthy sparring partner, but just what was she?

 

“We've duelled in the past, and you can't keep up with me,” he pointed out, hoping to get rid of her.

 

“I know I can't,” she replied, thinning her features as she regarded him. “Which is exactly why I would like to train with you.”

 

“But…” Zoro began desperately. “You'll hold me back.”

 

“I'm not asking for much,” she replied quietly. “Even just an hour a day.”

 

“An hour?” Zoro yelped.

 

“Fine then, half an hour,” she offered. “If you do this for me, I'll…”

 

Zoro saw the girl's eyes wander, and turning his head, he saw that she was casting his Wado Ichimonji the kind of look Sanji usually used on Nami when she stripped down to the skimpiest of outfits.

 

“I'll let you keep the Wado Ichimonji, even though it pains me to know that you are abusing it so,” she said tightly, meeting Zoro's eyes with her determined expression once more set in place.

 

And, Zoro thought with an inward sigh, it was that look that made her resemble Kuina the most. Saying no to her now was as good as turning down another chance to face Kuina, and that was something he had never refused, no matter how many times she beaten him senseless.

 

“I'll give you fifteen minutes, including warm-up, you will not so much as look at my Wado Ichimonji ever again, and…” Zoro paused as he tried to think of something else vile to through into his bargaining, in the hope of dissuading the girl altogether. “And if you ever call me Smoker again, you'll leave the navy.”

 

The girl frowned at him, but Zoro merely shrugged his shoulders.

 

“He's an old man, it was an insult,” he said, hoping his words did not sound as childish to her as they did to his own ears.

 

“Captain Smoker is ten times the man you are,” she coldly replied. “It hurt me more than you to confuse the two of you. It was an honest mistake, his hair was wet, and I thought I saw a scar on his chest.”

 

Zoro frowned lightly, touching a hand to the wound Mihawk had inflicted upon him, touching the part where it tore across his heart. How did she know that he had that scar - was this not the first time he had been shirtless around this girl?

 

“Seaweed…” he muttered, as the image of the marine captain strangling him returned to his mind. “He had seaweed on his chest.”

 

“Oh…” she said slowly, nodding her head, her eyes lowering to her feet. “Twenty minutes, and you have yourself a deal.”

 

She lifted her eyes back to Zoro's, outstretching a hand towards him. He quirked an eyebrow at her curiously, wondering if she had forgotten telling him back on the island earlier that she did not “make deals with pirates”.

 

“Twenty minutes,” he agreed gruffly, grabbing her hand to shake it.

 

Zoro shook her hand, but found her grip tightening ever so slightly as he went to release her hand. He instantly met her eyes, studying her carefully. Her expression was blank, leaving Zoro with the realisation that he was holding her hand for an unusual length of time, and he had not even said anything.

 

“Right then,” he said, grabbing back his hand and moving it to the back of his head, raking his finger at his hair. “I'll see you later.”

 

Before she could talk at him any more, Zoro grabbed the railings, leaping over them and down to the lower deck, walking briskly away from her, something telling him that distance would relieve the knot that was forming in the pit of his gut.

 

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Tashigi sighed, balling her hands into fists at her sides as she looked out across the water. Instinctively, she was looking for the reassuring blue insignia of the navy, a sure sign that she could escape the pirate ship she had somehow ended up on, and return to her rightful place with the marines, working under and alongside Captain Smoker. Of course, in the absence of her glasses, Tashigi could see little more than hazes of colour, and she knew that she would not be able to recognise any ship until it was within easy swimming distance of the pirate ship.

 

Tapping her foot nervously and releasing a sigh, Tashigi silently admitted that she felt lost. Being without proper sleeping quarters or her personal belongings was nothing out of the ordinary for her, but being without her glasses, her treasured Shigure and Captain Smoker, she felt completely lost. The hardest thing for her to accept was trying to decide what to do - and not just in respect to how she was going to get herself away from the Straw-Hat Pirates and back to the navy. The more thought she invested in the matter, the more Tashigi realised that she did, quite literally, “tail Mister Smoker's ankles all day”, just as Captain Hina had once accused her of, and without Mister Smoker around, she had nothing to do and nowhere to go.

 

That, she thought sourly, just sounded pathetic. She was an intelligent and sensible woman, she was certain she could find ways to keep herself busy without her commanding officer around. It was just a sense of habit, she told herself firmly. Just like when Smoker had left her in charge in Arabasta, she had been confused, lost and desperate for his presence then, and it was simply because she was so accustomed to having him around to make decisions and give her orders. It was nothing, she would survive this just as she had survived the horrid ordeal in Arabasta; only this time, she would not return to her captain as a silly, tearful little girl. She would return with her head held high and make him proud of her.

 

But, she thought to herself, chewing on her lip as her face began to twist into a frown, she did really miss not being able to simply fetch a tray of tea or coffee to bring to her captain, if only to drink it whilst listening to him talk about something pointless like recent significant promotions of officers they both knew. Their conversations were always of the same nature: the navy, marine business, politics and the agenda for the day. Smoker had never volunteered any personal information in the many hours they had spent talking, and Tashigi had never dared asked. She had occasionally slipped in some information about herself in the hope that he might reciprocate; but her endeavours had always been without success. The only thing she did know now was that Smoker was apparently involved with Hina - not that Tashigi was entirely surprised by this piece of information. Why not, she thought? They were both of the same rank, both very successful and much respected, they had known each other for probably close to twenty years and they certainly had a unique banter between them.

 

And Hina was quite easily the prettiest officer in the navy, Tashigi thought darkly. Just the mere mention of her name brought a doe-eyed look to the faces of every male marine in the vicinity.

 

Tashigi sighed, turning around to see Zoro sat above her head, stripped to the waist, doing arm curls with a seemingly unreasonable weight, sweat glistening across his bronzed body, his face taut from the obvious strain of his exertions. As she watched him, he grabbed up a bottle of cheap rum, gulping down an unhealthy amount before slamming the bottle back down at his side. Tashigi clicked her tongue involuntarily unable to stop her mind from making the association of the idiot man who considered himself invincible because he was physically strong, forgetting that combat was about more than just sheer strength. In fact, Tashigi thought to herself, since she was feeling rough around the edges, Zoro might just prove to be the welcome distraction from her misery that she sought.

 

“There's more to being a great swordsman than just brute strength, you know!” she called up to him.

 

Zoro turned his head at the sound of her voice, scowling down at her, his arm slowing as he spoke his rebuttal.

 

“Yes there is,” he called back to her. “A sense of balance, grace, being prepared at all times and being able to see what lies beyond the end of your own sword!”

 

Tashigi pulled a face at him in disgust. It was hardly fair to point out her weaknesses so bluntly, particularly when all the points he had raised were matters beyond her own personal control - it was not her own doing that she was so clumsy, nor could she help her poor eyesight, least of all since Zoro had so kindly destroyed her glasses.

 

“Stop looking at me with that face!” he snapped suddenly, awakening Tashigi from her thoughts abruptly and abrasively.

 

“I was born with this face!” she yelled back indignantly.

 

Zoro pulled a face at her looking suddenly very childish from the angle Tashigi was watching him from.

 

“I think you have a beautiful face, Tashigi-swan!” the chef said sweetly, appearing from nowhere at her side to cast her a grin so cheesy, it made her feel a little nauseous. “Don't mind Marimo. Here, something sweet for someone sweet!”

 

Tashigi looked down at the small silver tray balanced perfectly on Sanji's fingertips, finding a small collection of handmade sweet cakes, a medium quality goblet and a newly opened bottle of red wine.

 

“Oh no thank you Sanji,” she said, gently pushing the offer away. “I don't drink alcohol.”

 

“Ha!” Zoro blurted from above her head.

 

Tashigi looked up in time to see Zoro throw back a mouthful of rum, a small trickle missing his intended target and slipping down one corner of his mouth. He grinned at Tashigi as he slammed the bottle back down at his side, at which she merely tilted her head to one side, wondering what he hoped to achieve with such a disgusting display.

 

“Face it, you can't drink alcohol!” he called down to her. “You're already a walking disaster with no sense of balance!”

 

“If drinking alcohol will turn me into a bitter, twisted criminal like you, I won't ever drink it!” she yelled back.

 

“Don't give me that crap, you sailors are always getting drunk!” Zoro scoffed.

 

“You know nothing!” Tashigi exploded, despising his use of such a stereotype, particularly since he himself was nothing more than a pirate.

 

“I know a lot more than you!” Zoro shot back. “While you've been polishing Smokey's boots, I've been out in the world learning and improving myself and my skills!”

 

Tashigi yelped, her temper flaring. Without thinking sensibly, she leapt forwards, grabbing onto the cabin and nimbly scaling it to the upper deck, standing over Zoro to glare down at him.

 

“Hey!” he cried, eying her over. “Are you stupid? What do you think you're doing? You shouldn't be climbing up like that, you could have fallen!”

 

“Oh what would you care if I did fall and break my neck?” she shot back, planting her hands on her hips.

 

Tashigi watched Zoro's face go unusually blank for a prolonged period, his eyes lose a little of their lustre as his mind appeared to wander to something. The odd look on his face soon melted however, and he turned his head from her.

 

“I don't want to have to listen to Smokey cry like a baby when he finds out you died being stupid,” he said bluntly, recommencing his exercises.

 

“You don't have to worry about that, Captain Smoker doesn't believe in crying!” she snippily replied, knowing this to be a fact thanks to her recent first-hand experience of the matter.

 

“Then why does he keep you around?” Zoro asked her, smirking as he cast her a sideward glance.

 

Zoro's words cut into Tashigi much deeper than she suspected he would ever know. She stiffened, part of her screaming that he was right - Smoker did not want a miserable crying, hormonal girl as his second-in-command, what use was she to him anyway? But Tashigi was also determined to prove them wrong - both of them. She would prove to Zoro that she was a formidable opponent, and she would prove to Smoker that she was worthy to stand alongside him in rank.

 

“How long am I going to be here?” she quietly asked Zoro, an idea forming in her mind of how she could fulfil both of her wishes with one easy action.

 

“What?” Zoro grunted.

 

Zoro dropped his dumbbell, turning to look directly at her.

 

“How long am I going to be here?” she asked him quietly, one hand fidgeting with the empty scabbard she still had tied to her hip as her mind began formulating the finer points of her plan. “With you.”

 

Zoro shot to his feet, a fearful look fleeting across his eyes as he studied her.

 

“What do you mean with me?” he asked her.

 

“Well, I…” Tashigi began slowly. “I thought maybe if I'm going to be your prisoner here for more than a few days, perhaps we could train together.”

 

“No, absolutely not!” he dismissed.

 

“Why not?” she instantly responded, refusing to back down now that she had proposed the idea. “We're both swordsmen, we both need to keep our skills sharp. I would have thought that you would have been glad to have someone to spar with.”

 

“But you're not someone to spar with, you're…”

 

`I'm what?' Tashigi thought dryly. `Just a girl? A klutz? Not strong enough for you?'

 

“We've duelled in the past, and you can't keep up with me,” he eventually said.

 

“I know I can't,” she confessed, suppressing the pain it caused her to admit as much. “Which is exactly why I would like to train with you.”

 

“But…” Zoro began. “You'll hold me back.”

 

“I'm not asking for much,” she replied quietly. “Even just an hour a day.”

 

“An hour?” Zoro yelped.

 

“Fine then, half an hour,” she offered. “If you do this for me, I'll…”

 

Tashigi looked over at the beautiful, precious, irreplaceable Wado Ichimonji, which lay on the deck just behind where Zoro had been sat. Watching it forlornly, Tashigi realised there was perhaps just one way she could bargain with this pirate.

 

“I'll let you keep the Wado Ichimonji, even though it pains me to know that you are abusing it so,” she said tightly, meeting Zoro's eyes with determination.

 

She saw him purse his lips, a thoughtful look passing over his eyes before he answered her.

 

“I'll give you fifteen minutes, including warm-up, you will not so much as look at my Wado Ichimonji ever again,” he offered. “And… And if you ever call me Smoker again, you'll leave the navy.”

 

Tashigi frowned at him sceptically, wondering why he had felt the need to add such a strange final qualification to his offer.

 

“He's an old man, it was an insult,” he said childishly, shrugging his shoulders and pouting slightly, looking suddenly ten years younger than he actually was.

 

Hearing him so easily cast out such a pitiful insult against her captain made Tashigi's blood boil, and logic left her as she answered him.

 

“Captain Smoker is ten times the man you are,” she said coldly, not caring how big a dent her words may make to his pride. “It hurt me more than you to confuse the two of you. It was an honest mistake, his hair was wet, and I thought I saw a scar on his chest.”

 

Tashigi saw Zoro touch a hand to the centre of his chest self-consciously, his fingertips gingerly brushing over the welt in his skin. The look on his face told her the scar carried with it terrible memories - it was a horrific injury, stretching from just below his left shoulder, across the centre of his chest, to his right hip - it looked as though the wound had been inflicted by a sword, and had been almost mortally deep. Tashigi felt a little guilty for having mentioned it: Zoro was covered with scars of varying degrees, whilst she herself had but three, only one of which was visible, and barely so at that. The majority of her sword-fights had been done under a controlled environment in her training, whereas Zoro had obviously been involved in a lot of duels to the death, resulting in his suffering such serious injuries.

 

“Seaweed…” he muttered quietly, his hand slowly lowering to his side once more. “He had seaweed on his chest.”

 

“Oh…” Tashigi said slowly, nodding her head, her eyes lowering to her feet as she realised how particularly bad her eyesight and judgement had been that night, to mistake seaweed for a scar. “Twenty minutes, and you have yourself a deal,” she proposed quietly, hoping to force his hand.

 

She slowly looked up at Zoro again, holding out her hand to seal the deal and to assure herself that she had at least earned some degree of commitment from him. He cast her a suspicious look, but took hold of her hand regardless.

 

“Twenty minutes,” he agreed gruffly.

 

They shook hands briefly, and Tashigi promptly made to retrieve her hand, only for Zoro to tighten his grip, holding her in place. His eyes flicked to hers, and she found him studying her with an unsettling, intense look on his face. Tashigi began to feel awkward standing there with her worst enemy holding onto her hand and staring at her so, especially when she could sense he was thinking about something that appeared oddly sinister.

 

“Right then,” she said, deciding to end the tension, yanking her hand back and promptly placing both her hands behind her back. “I'll see you later.”

 

Before he could say or do anything else to make her feel any more awkward, Tashigi moved to the ladder, hurriedly descending it to the lower deck, where she promptly walked off, trying to put as much distance between herself and Zoro as she could, at least until the buzzing feeling in her chest had subsided.

 

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Smoker sat forwards, earning him a short, sharp, disgusted sigh from Hina, which he easily ignored, focussing his attention on the officer who had just entered the office.

 

“Did you find it yet?” he demanded.

 

“No Sir, but we did find this,” the man replied, lifting up one hand.

 

Smoker shot out of his chair, gasping at what he saw. Cradled in the palm of the man's hand was a crushed, damp, but sickeningly familiar pair of square, red-rimmed glasses.

 

“Tashigi…” he whispered, pinching one bent leg between his thumb and forefinger and gently lifting them upwards.

 

“I'll let you know immediately if we find any trace of the sword, Sir,” the officer added, bowing his head to Smoker. “Captain Hina, may I saw you look as lovely as ever.”

 

“No, you may not,” Hina sorely replied.

 

The officer floundered at her response, his face turning a little pink. He looked up at Smoker questioningly, but Smoker merely rolled his eyes.

 

“Good work, but step it up a bit, we need that sword,” he instructed.

 

“Yes, Sir,” the man replied, saluting him.

 

Smoker watched the man go before looking down at the crumpled remains of Tashigi's glasses in his hands. Had she been wearing her glasses when she had attached herself to Zoro, he wondered? He could not quite remember, but he was certain that she had been wearing them when she had pleaded with him to spare Zoro's life.

 

“Perhaps while Mister Smoker is being pathetic over a broken pair of glasses, Hina will go out and arrest some criminals,” Hina said snippily behind him. “And when Hina collects the bounties on their heads, Mister Smoker can use the money to buy his little pet a new toy.”

 

“I'm not leaving here without her sword, Hina,” Smoker said bluntly, dropping himself back into his seat with a sigh. “I just feel so useless right now! If I could swim, I could have found it myself by now!”

 

“Hina would like to point out that Mister Smoker knew the side-effects of eating a Devil Fruit before-”

 

“Yes, thank you Hina.”

 

Smoker slowly rubbed his fingers together, watching Tashigi's glasses spin beneath his hand. Wherever she was, he thought, she was not only without her sword, but she was also without her glasses, leaving her particularly prone. Smoker felt reasonably confident that she would be safe with Straw-Hat himself, but as for the other men in the Straw-Hat crew, Smoker could only cringe at the thought. Zoro, who was doubtlessly the typical ladies' man, was probably the biggest threat to the safety of a girl like Tashigi. And that blonde-haired one that had called himself “Mr Prince” was obviously not much better. Smoker began to grow tense again, the agony of how painfully naïve and vulnerable Tashigi truly was becoming too much for him once more.

 

“Stop it!” Hina hissed, suddenly grabbing Smoker's knee.

 

He turned his head, eying her questioningly as she gripped her gloved fingers into his leg, her grasp becoming a little more than just a discomfort.

 

“Your leg keeps jittering,” she growled out, locking her dark eyes onto his. “It's not very becoming of a captain of the navy.”

 

“Yes…” Smoker said slowly, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth as an idea occurred to him as to how he could pass the time a little more pleasantly. “Although, technically speaking, Mister Smoker isn't a captain any more…”

 

Smoker grinned shamelessly at Hina as her face dropped.

 

“You refused that promotion, Mister Smoker,” she hissed.

 

Smoker widened his grin a little, feeling marginally better when she growled like an enraged cat and stood from her chair, marching across the room.

 

“Hina isn't happy,” she moaned. “You make me unhappy, Mister Smoker,” she added, turning slightly to point at him.

 

Smoker shrugged his shoulders, slowly sitting back into his chair.

 

“You never change,” she added. “I hated you then, and I hate you now!”

 

“That's not how I remember it…” Smoker said slyly, faking a thoughtful look.

 

“You are cruel and pig-headed!” Hina snapped.

 

Smoker grinned at her until she snarled out another frustrated yelp, spinning around to turn her back on him, her hair flying through the air around her.

 

“Do you know why Hina likes Miss Tashigi so much, Mister Smoker?” she asked moodily.

 

“No idea,” Smoker casually replied.

 

“Because Hina pities the poor girl, having to work under a big bully like you!”

 

Smoker's grin faded, his mind once more wandering to darker matters. Of course, Hina was only calling him a bully because he was the one man in the navy that she had not managed to successfully wind around her little finger - quite the opposite, in fact - but her words did make Smoker wonder if perhaps Tashigi had left because he had been too hard on her. He had worried in the past about over-stepping the boundaries of their relationship: he was, after all, her commanding officer, and it would have been unfitting to ever abuse his position as such. But, the day she had returned to the docks after the disaster in Arabasta, looking thoroughly defeated both physically and mentally, only to retire to her room where she cried herself to sleep, maybe, just maybe, that was a time when it would not have been so wrong to at least offer her some sympathy. She had seriously injured her leg, she had contusions around her neck that suggested someone had tried to strangle her, she had various other minor bruises and cuts, and she was obviously exhausted, having lost a night's sleep. He had left her in charge and she had returned to him broken and beaten.

 

Once Tashigi had awoken, she had approached him, whereupon he had launched into discussing the new, higher bounties the navy had placed upon the heads of Straw-Hat Luffy and Roronoa Zoro. Although, Smoker reasoned, he had inquired after her injuries. Typically though, Tashigi had avoided answering him. He suspected she did not like to admit any weaknesses to him, and admitting that she still hurt like hell was doing just that. Equally, she would never pretend to be fine when she was not, since she was practically unable to lie. She was good, clean and righteous - perfect fodder for filthy pirates.

 

Smoker dropped his head into his hand, closing his other fist around her glasses, hoping his worst fears had not yet become a reality, and that he would get to Tashigi long before they did.

 

“Sir, a local fisherman just handed this in.”

 

Smoker lifted his head sharply, his eyes instantly locking onto the object the officer before him held.

 

“About time,” he sighed, standing up to grab Tashigi's sword from his hand. “We're leaving. Now.”

 

Smoker marched past Hina, who momentarily appeared a little flustered.

 

“Don't you think you ought to put your coat on, Mister Smoker?” she called after him.

 

“Uh, yeah, right,” he called back. “Get that for me, would you?”

 

Ignoring the sound of Hina cursing his name, Smoker marched onwards towards the docks, craning his neck to survey the ships available. Hina had offered him a small ship that would be suitable for him and a small crew, but he decided that he would simply pick the fastest, most robust ship he could find, and Hina would just have to like it.

 

“We're taking this one,” he told his officers, pointing a thumb at one of Hina's higher-grade ships.

 

“Are you sure Sir?” one officer asked him nervously.

 

“Are you questioning my decision?” Smoker snapped at him irritably.

 

“No Sir, it was just that those two idiots are on that ship.”

 

Smoker frowned at the officer, unsure as to what he was trying to say. The marine eventually pointed at something over Smoker's shoulder. Smoker turned his head, finding two men in plain clothing walking towards them both cradling impractically large bunches of flowers in their arms.

 

“Who the hell is that?” he asked, turning back to the officer in front of him.

 

“Fullbody and Jango, Sir,” the man replied. “One is a former Second Lieutenant who was demoted for conspiring with pirates, the other is a former pirate.”

 

“Huh?” Smoker echoed, glancing back and forth between the two men approaching and the officer in front of him. “What the hell is Hina thinking having men like that in her crew?”

 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

 

Next Chapter: Tashigi starts her training with Zoro, Smoker sets off in search of Tashigi and the Straw-Hat Pirates and Zoro suspects that Tashigi is flirting with him - but it's alright, because there's a navy vessel in sight, and Smoker's onboard looking very, very happy… Chapter 9 - A Powerful Dance.